Lifetime
by robbiepoo2341
Summary: (Not shipping) Dean has never met anyone like the Doctor before. For that matter, the Doctor hasn't met anyone like Dean. They keep meeting out of order, too, and that only complicates what is already a rocky relationship. The Doctor isn't human, after all, and he has a tendency to show up when trouble is brewing.
1. Book One: Stranger, Chapter One

A/N: I haven't ever done a crossover before, and this is certainly one of the most challenging projects I've ever started. First of all, this is going to take place in several parts, called books, each with its own contained story. Like an episode. So this whole thing is like a season? I guess? Except not with twenty episodes. I can't do that. I also won't be updating every day like I've done with my other two Supernatural fics. School is starting soon, and I've got a publishing internship this semester. At most, I can promise a chapter a week. That much I can safely guarantee. But whether you get two or three chapters a week as well is debatable and depends on how much homework I have. :)

Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

**Book One: Stranger**

Dean really wasn't feeling very good at all.

Dad was out on a hunting trip, though, so Dean had to make the trip down to the grocery store on his own. He couldn't quite reach the top shelves with the strong stuff, but he could get some basic cold medicine and a nasal spray that worked when Sammy was sick, so hopefully it would work for him.

It was obvious to everyone in the store that he wasn't feeling good. His little hands reached out to grab every shelf as he passed by, and he could only breathe through his mouth. His whole head felt like it was going to explode, but he had to get in and out of the store fast; he'd left Sammy home alone, and he definitely wasn't supposed to do that.

But what was he supposed to do? He couldn't even sleep anymore because he kept waking up every fifteen minutes unable to breathe. And there were just some things that he couldn't put off until Dad got home. Besides, Sammy was asleep, so it wasn't like the kid could possibly get himself in any real danger.

And he'd only been gone for maybe ten minutes. He'd be back in no time.

Dean stumbled a little bit. He wasn't used to trying to get his balance like this. He was only eight, but already he was the best shot his dad had seen—his words exactly, and Dean was never going to forgot that—and he could handle himself in a fight. He was supposed to be good, Dad's little soldier. And so he hated being sick.

When he stumbled, he felt a hand behind his back, and a woman's voice said, "You okay there?"

Dean looked up. The voice wasn't American, and he wondered what this pretty lady was doing out here in the middle of nowhere. This definitely wasn't a popular tourist spot.

She was really pretty, actually. She had dark, smooth skin, and she had her hair pulled back so it was kind of spiky in the back. She was wearing a red leather jack, which Dean heartily approved of. And she had a really pretty smile. So, Dean tried to pull himself together and give her his best flirting smile. "I'm just fine, thanks," he tried to say, but the "thanks" came out as more of a "danks," so it was obvious he wasn't actually fine.

The woman crouched down in front of him and put her hand to his forehead. He would have tried to fight her off, but it was really all he could do at this point to keep himself standing, much less fight off someone who was obviously just trying to be too nice. "Doctor," the woman said quietly.

Oh, great. Dean hated doctors.

He tried to wave her off. "I'll be okay. I got medicine," he said.

The woman looked down at the stuff he had in his hands and shook her head. She knelt down and looked in his eyes, ears, nose, mouth. He would have tried to bite her for her troubles, but he needed to keep his mouth open so he could breathe, so that wasn't really an option. "That's not going to be any good. You haven't got a cold. I'll bet it's a sinus infection."

Dean frowned. He wasn't sure what the difference was, but he was quite sure that the second thing was harder to treat, and he didn't have the money for much more than what he was holding.

The woman seemed to understand his dilemma, and she took him under her arm. He wanted to protest, to pull against her, but he couldn't breathe, and he couldn't do much talking. And she didn't seem too bad, and Dean was pretty good at reading people. He didn't necessarily trust her, but he also wasn't going to use the gun he had tucked away in his little backpack.

"Doctor?" the woman called again.

A really tall guy poked his head out from behind one of the counters. He was carrying two jugs of milk—which was apparently why they were there in the first place. He had a huge, stupid grin on his face, and he looked over at the pretty lady with wide eyes. "Yeah?"

"I think we should help this young man get back home," the woman said.

"I can get home by myself. Lemme alone," Dean muttered. But there was really no stopping them anymore. The tall guy was grinning even more stupidly, and the pretty lady was checking his forehead for a temperature again.

The lady took the medicines gently out of his hands. "How much money did you bring, Doctor Smith?" she asked. (For some reason, when she called the doctor by his full name, she could not stop herself from smiling.)

The doctor person pulled out a bunch of bills from his pocket. "This enough, Doctor Jones?"

The lady rolled her eyes. "We should be fine," she said. She grabbed the stethoscope from around Doctor Smith's neck and listened to Dean breathing, just to finish her little checkup, then nodded as if she had already decided what Dean had and she was just finalizing the decision.

"Doctor Jones?" Dean repeated. He scrunched up his nose. She definitely didn't look old enough to be a doctor, and even if she was, Dean still didn't like doctors, no matter how pretty they were.

"That's me," the lady said. She motioned her other doctor friend over and held out her hand expectantly. Dean didn't know what she was doing, but the other doctor seemed to understand, and he put both jugs of milk in one hand so that he could dig around in his pockets. Finally, he found an old, tattered wallet and handed it to Martha.

"Come on," she said. "I know just what to get you." She paused. "You're not allergic to anything, are you?"

Dean shook his head.

Doctor Jones walked him up to the pharmaceutical counter. The lady behind the counter looked over at the two of them, and her lips pressed into a thin line. (Dean could tell what she was thinking; this lady wasn't his mother, so what was she doing there?)

"I'm Doctor Martha Jones," the lady said, handing over the tattered old wallet to the lady behind the counter. "This is one of my patients, and here's his prescription."

(Dean was confused. He had seen the wallet before, and it had a blank page in it. But when Doctor Jones handed it over, it had writing on it. How did that work? He hadn't seen her writing on it before.)

"That's a bit unusual, bringing him here yourself."

Dean frowned and opened his mouth to try and explain himself, but he could not get out more than a faint squeak before he realized he was going to have to sit down. Doctor Jones caught him and helped him to his seat, then smiled at the counter lady. "I have a soft spot for kids," she said, "especially when his parents don't care enough to notice when their son tries to self-medicate."

The lady behind the counter nodded her understanding, then went back into the pharmacy to get the things Doctor Jones had prescribed for him.

"Listen," Doctor Jones said as she crouched down in front of Dean, "can I trust you to read the labels right on the stuff I give you?"

"I'm not stupid."

"I never said you were," Doctor Jones said with a smile. She laughed when he pouted at her, which was exactly not the reaction he wanted. "I can tell you're a responsible kid if you're here on your own."

"I can take care of . . . ." He took a deep, rattling breath—it was hard to talk and concentrate on breathing at the same time. " . . . of myself."

"I'm sure you can." She gave him another big smile. "Where are your parents, anyway?"

Dean glared. That was the one question grown-ups were always asking him that he hated having to answer. They would always get so upset, like his dad was awful for leaving him on his own or some other nonsense like that. They didn't understand. His dad was a hero, and it wasn't his fault that his heroics meant sometimes he had to leave Dean in charge. Besides, Dean could handle it. "My dad's working," he said. "I gotta get home and take care of my brother."

Doctor Jones frowned. "You're home alone?"

Dean felt his fists clench. He hated that, hated when grown-ups acted like it was such a big deal. It really wasn't. He was very much fine with being alone because he knew how to take care of Sammy maybe even better than Dad did. And that was really all that mattered—taking care of Sammy. But now this grown-up doctor was taking Dean's precious time to give him a checkup and medicines he didn't really want, and what if Sammy woke up with nightmares and Dean wasn't there? He really needed to get back.

Doctor Smith came back to the pharmacy with a plastic bag in his hand with both jugs of milk inside. He looked over Dean, then Doctor Jones, then tilted his head at her in an unasked question.

"We're going to make sure he gets home safe, aren't we, Doctor Smith?" Doctor Jones asked, straightening Dean's collar for him. (Dean glared at her.)

"Of course," Doctor Smith said. He beamed at Dean. He also had a British accent, so maybe they were a couple? Dean frowned at them both, but then he had to turn away and sneeze, so they didn't get how annoyed he was with both of them trying to interfere in his life.

Finally, the lady behind the counter came back with some medicines, and Doctor Jones paid her and handed them to Dean as she ushered him towards the front door. "Now, make sure you take them only as often as the label—"

"I'm not stupid," Dean said. He snatched the bag out of her hands. "And I don't need your charity. How much did the medicine cost?"

Doctor Jones frowned down at him, but before she could say anything, the lights in the grocery store started to flicker.

Dean looked up and immediately went for his backpack. He stuffed the bag of medicine in the top pocket before he went for the main one. The whole place felt cold, and Dean knew exactly what that meant.

"That's not good," Doctor Jones said.

"No, it's very much not," said Doctor Smith. He fished some brown-rimmed glasses out of his pocket and stared around the dark before he looked down at Dean again and realized that the eight-year-old was holding a gun. "Oh, now, that's even worse. Where did you get _that_?" Doctor Smith asked, wrinkling his nose and looking at the gun like it was the enemy and not whatever was making the lights flicker.

"Shut up. Me and my dad handle this kind of stuff all the time," Dean said. He tried to sound braver than he felt, not only because he was sick and sounded weak anyway, but because he hadn't really ever fought anything without Dad.

"Don't you want to see what it is first before you go shooting it?" Doctor Smith asked. He held out his hand to try and take the gun from Dean, but Dean was having none of that.

"Shoot first, ask questions later. Otherwise, you end up dead," Dean said. He kept a firm grip on the gun, but by then, the crisis had passed. The lights were restored, and the cold went away.

"Ah, see, there. That's better," Doctor Smith said, with still one eye on Dean and the gun.

Carefully, slowly, Dean put the gun back in his bag. "Says you," he muttered. It had been his experience that when things went away, it was usually because they'd gotten what they wanted.

Doctor Smith stared long and hard at Dean before he turned back to Doctor Jones. "You know something, Martha. I think our grocery trip just got extended," he said.


	2. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Two

A/N: So I've had some practice with Dean, but this is my first time ever writing from the Doctor's point of view. So I'm really, really open to suggestions. Criticism AND praise would be greatly appreciated. Thanks!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or anything related to these two great shows.

...

"Is this where you live?"

The little boy nodded. He was still holding tight to the shotgun, which was way too big for him, but the Doctor couldn't get it out of his hands, and he wasn't going to fight a kid over a loaded gun. He didn't look scared though, like the Doctor expected. He just looked tired. Sick, tired, and worried, like he'd seen all this before.

The Doctor couldn't shake the feeling that he'd seen the kid before.

"Do you want us to walk you to the door?" Martha asked. She was worried; the Doctor could tell. And the poor kid looked like he could hardly stay on his feet.

"Dad says not to take strangers home," the kid said.

"Can you at least tell us your name?"

The little boy glared at them both. He kept the gun clenched tightly in his hands, but he looked up at Martha and decided that at least she was probably trustworthy. "Dean," he said at last.

Dean. That sounded familiar.

"Well, Dean. I hope you make it home okay," Martha said. She tucked in his shirt around the edges, and this time, Dean didn't try to fight her. (It had been the Doctor's experience that most people learned not to fight Martha when she wanted her way—it was for their own good.)

"Thanks," Dean said. It didn't sound like he was used to saying thank you, either, and the Doctor could not help smiling.

They waited the appropriate amount of time before he glanced at Martha. "He doesn't really live here," he said.

"I didn't think so," Martha said. "Should we follow him?"

"What? Tail a kid we've never met before who's probably armed and dangerous and obviously knows something about what happened back at the store?" The Doctor broke out into a broad grin. "Brilliant!"

Martha just rolled her eyes at him. "Just so long as you stay quiet, Mister," she said, trying not to grin at him. He missed that smile; he hadn't seen it in a while, not since he'd been John Smith last month and completely wrecked three entire months of her life. It was going to take her a long time to get over that, and he didn't really blame her, but she never smiled anymore.

But Dean could get her to smile. Martha was good with kids.

They were careful, of course. They watched Dean sneak through the backyard of the nearest neighborhood home, climb a fence, and head back towards the store. They stayed a good distance behind so as not to draw attention and make him even more nervous than he already was.

The Doctor raised an eyebrow at Martha. Was Dean really headed back there to investigate himself? The poor boy could hardly stand on his own!

But no, Dean didn't go to the store. He turned towards the motel, which must have been where he was staying, but then he stopped, ducked down behind some trash cans, and before the Doctor and Martha could find him again, he was gone.

"Oh, he's good," the Doctor said. He ran his hand down his chin. "Someone's trained that boy, turned him into some kind of soldier." He narrowed his eyes at the thought, and he could tell Martha was just as bothered.

"So, now what do we do?" Martha asked.

The Doctor tilted his head at her, then broke out into a wide grin. "Well," he said slowly, "we could always go back to that grocery store. Whatever happened back there wasn't exactly normal."

"Yeah—what was that, anyway?" Martha asked.

The Doctor shook his head. "You know, I'm not really sure." He frowned, shook his head, and ran his hands through his hair. "I could feel something off," he said. "Mild telepathic disturbance—just for a second. And all the hairs stood up on the back of my head."

"Okay, nobody move," said a voice behind them as a short shadow stepped out from behind the nearest corner.

The Doctor frowned. "Dean . . . ."

"I said don't move," Dean said, more forcefully this time, and the Doctor was not surprised to feel the barrel of a gun between his shoulder blades—though he was disappointed.

"Okay, okay," the Doctor said, holding up his hands. "Not moving. See? Not moving."

"Why are you following me?" Dean demanded. He sounded shaky.

"What? Little boy with a gun and a fever?" the Doctor shot back. "You piqued our interest."

"Yeah, well, back off, if you know what's good for you. If I see you come anywhere near me or my brother again, I'll shoot first."

That was when the Doctor saw him: the little boy who had poked his head out the door of a motel room. The little boy who looked so scared and lost, who looked just enough like Dean that the family resemblance was obvious once the Doctor had a name for it.

Sam. The kid's name was Sam. And the Doctor had met both of these boys before; he just knew it. He couldn't remember when, though. Or where. But both of the boys had been older then, so this was a whole new beginning in their eyes. The life of a time-traveler.

"We're going. We're going," the Doctor said. Dean moved back so that he and Martha could stand, and now that the Doctor could actually see him, he saw that Dean was a little woozy on his feet, threatening to tip over. It would have been easy just to take the gun and settle down the situation, but then there was little Sam watching from the corner. He wouldn't understand; he would think his brother was in trouble.

Dean managed to get himself to the door, and even from where the Doctor was standing, he could hear the tremor in the little brother's voice. "Dean? What's going on?"

"Go to bed, Sammy. You had a nightmare."

"Who were those people?"

"Nobody, Sammy. You're dreaming. Go back to bed before you sleepwalk yourself into the next state."

"You promise you're okay?"

"I'm fine. Sorry I was gone for so long."

The Doctor almost smiled at the two brothers. Even when Dean was sick and feverish, he stood up a little straighter when his little brother was around. He needed someone to be strong for; the Doctor could relate. (He glanced over at Martha, who was stuck somewhere between concern for the little boy who owned a gun and pleasure at watching two brothers who obviously loved each other.)

But then Dean was glaring at them through his window, and the Doctor held up his hands in a gesture of peace. He gestured for Martha to follow him as he backed out of the motel parking lot, and they headed back to the TARDIS with their hands in their pockets.

"I'll bet he knows what's happening here," the Doctor said. "Or at least he's got some idea."

"What makes you so sure?"

"I've met him before."

Martha raised her eyebrows at him. "Yeah? And all your old friends point guns at you?" She held up a hand to stop his response. "Wait. Don't answer that."

The Doctor just smiled. "Well, I've met him, but he hasn't met me yet." He waved his hands. "Time travel."

Martha just smiled one of her "tolerating the Doctor" smiles, the ones where her lips got tight and she rolled her eyes. "That doesn't help us very much, does it?"

The Doctor shrugged. "Well, it just might, actually." He rushed back to the TARDIS controls and flipped the psychic regulator switch, then the electromagnetic frequency identifier. He watched the readings carefully, even slipped on his brainy specs for a closer examination.

"Doctor?" Martha came up behind him, put her arm up on the console where it wouldn't press too many buttons, then looked at the readings along with him. "What are you looking for?"

He grinned at her. Good ol' Martha Jones, never content to just stand by. Of course she wanted the play-by-play, and maybe that was why he'd kept her on for so long. He never could resist showing off. He pointed at the monitors. "Dean's going to grow up," he said.

"No. Really?" Martha pretended to be shocked. She liked to be sarcastic when the Doctor was only trying to pause for dramatic effect.

He raised an eyebrow at her. "Really," he said. "And in a few years, he's going to be a kid in a middle school on the other side of America."

"Moves around a lot, then?" Martha asked.

"You could say that. Point is, that kid is going to go into the family business. He's going to become a hunter—a monster hunter." He looked over the readings a couple more times, purposefully ignoring Martha's curious stares. "The electromagnetic readings are interesting." He licked his lips. "Something was definitely in the store the same time we were there, but what?"

"Well, what was it last time?" Martha had evidently given up on trying to get the Doctor to elaborate.

"Last time?"

"You know, last time you worked with Dean."

The Doctor laughed. "Long story."

Martha shrugged. "Long night."

"It was a rawhead, a creature that abducts naughty children."

"And it got Dean?"

"Hardly," the Doctor laughed. "Like I said, it's a long story."

Martha just smiled at him and tapped the console. "Well, I'll leave you to your little toys. I'm going to sleep for the night. Some of us actually do that."

"Okay. Good night, Martha," he said. He wondered why she paused for just a little bit longer, watching him and readouts, but everything was a little weird between them since John Smith, no matter how much they tried to pretend it wasn't.

The Doctor stared at the readings for a little longer. He had never seen readings like this before—this was something new. "Brilliant," he said out loud before he remembered that Martha was no longer around to listen to him. "I love it when I find new things," he continued, since he was already talking and didn't feel like stopping.

He waited until Martha was asleep before he moved the TARDIS. And he was careful to wait until he thought both Dean and Sam would also be asleep before he landed, since he knew the TARDIS could be loud.

He positioned the monitor so that he could see the boys' door. It had been a long time since he last saw Dean, but he hadn't forgotten the kid's propensity for getting himself in trouble.

But nothing bothered the boys that night, and there were no more interesting electromagnetic readings. Things were quiet.

It was nearly three in the morning when the Doctor finally got bored waiting around. He put on his coat and stepped out into the night air. He was at the grocery store in just a matter of minutes, and when he arrived, he jimmied open the automatic door with his sonic screwdriver. It was loud, and he shushed it—as if that would help.

He was just going to have a quick look around. He wasn't tired, and neither Martha nor Dean was going to be much help to him for a few more hours.

He was surprised to see that there was someone still behind the counter, and he tried to grin apologetically. "Sorry about that, miss. I was just . . . ." He trailed off. The girl wasn't moving.

The Doctor frowned. He had a sinking feeling about this, but he pushed forward anyway. "Excuse me?" he asked. He reached out for the girl, and her neck fell back with a snap.


	3. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Three

A/N: Once again, spent all my time at the airport writing fanfiction. One day I will rid myself of this obsession... ALSO MORE WEECHESTERS SO HOW COULD I RESIST.

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

"Dean, wake up."

Dean groaned and tried to pick his head up. The pillow was stuck to his face. Gross. He'd been drooling.

On the plus side, though, he could actually breathe that morning. Maybe that Doctor Jones lady wasn't so bad after all.

"Dean?"

Finally, he managed to get his head out of his pillow, and he forced himself to sit up and look at Sammy. The kid's nose was practically in his face, and Dean had to take a deep breath and physically force himself not to jerk away and scare his little brother. "Morning," he muttered. He could talk better now, too. That was good.

"Are you feeling okay, Dean? You've been asleep for an awful long time," Sammy said. His eyes were wide, and he was holding a roll of tissue paper out for Dean to blow his nose.

Dean smiled and took the gift. "Thanks, Sammy," he said, rubbing his hand in Sam's hair. Sammy grinned proudly. "I'm feeling a little bit better, yeah."

"Did you go to the doctor yesterday?"

"Sort of."

"Is that who you were talking to last night?"

Dean frowned. He had hoped that Sammy would just believe him, that the kid would run with the story Dean fed him about sleepwalking. It was frustrating; Sammy could remember every time Dean broke the rules or did something even slightly out of the ordinary, but he could hardly remember the name of the motel they were staying in when Dean asked him to write it down. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

Sammy frowned. "There were people outside last night."

"Oh. They were doctors, yeah," Dean said. He looked down at his sheets. They were tangled, and he actually had to concentrate to get himself out of there. And it was the truth, wasn't it? Doctors Smith and Jones.

"How come you were sleeping for so long?" Sammy asked.

"I didn't feel good. I'm sorry about that," Dean said. "Do you want me to make some breakfast?"

Sammy looked down at the ground, and Dean knew that look.

"What happened?"

Sammy didn't say anything, but he gestured at the table. Dean groaned and threw his head back, trying his very hardest not to swear, since Dad said he was supposed to be a good example for Sammy.

The milk was everywhere. Sammy had obviously done his best to try and clean it up; there were little pieces of tissue paper and paper towels everywhere, and a few puddles of water where he tried to mop, but the sink had overflowed. And then there was the cereal—little pieces of it everywhere, in the seats, the couch, everything.

"Please don't be mad," Sammy said.

Dean was mad, though; he was just good at hiding it. He used the cover of getting out of bed to compose himself, took a deep breath, then asked, "Why didn't you just wake me up to pour you some cereal?"

"You were sick," Sammy said.

If Dean had been mad before, he couldn't be mad anymore, not when his little Sammy was smiling at him like that and giving him his best, wide eyes and innocent look. And he couldn't really blame Sammy. His little brother had only been trying to be nice, to let him sleep a little longer and get over whatever this sickness was. Dean had done it a thousand times for Sam, and he couldn't help feel a little proud that Sammy paid enough attention to think that he could do that for Dean, too.

So, with a smile that was too broad, he just picked Sammy up and set him down on the one chair that hadn't been touched by the explosion of milk and cereal pieces. He wet a paper towel and started to wipe his brother's face and hair. "Thanks for helping me out, Sammy," he whispered.

"You're not mad?"

Dean looked out over the mess of things he knew he would have to clean before Dad got home. And then he looked at Sammy, who kept staring at him expectantly, waiting for the explosion. He sucked air through his teeth, plastered on a smile, then said, "Of course not. I'm not mad. I could never be mad at you, kiddo." He threw the paper towel away and looked his little brother over. "You're gonna need a bath," he said.

"Oh, I can do that one," Sammy said. He hopped down off his chair and slid in the milk, but he righted himself at the last second by grabbing Dean's shoulder. He beamed at Dean. "I'll clean up good; I promise!"

"Do you want me to run the water for you?" Dean asked.

"I can do it," Sammy insisted. "I'm not three anymore."

Dean shook his head and smiled. "Didn't say you were."

Sammy crossed his arms and tried to make himself look bigger, but it didn't really work when he had Cheerios in his hair. Dean just laughed and rushed him off, then set to work cleaning once he heard running water in the bathroom. "Use soap!" he shouted after his brother.

"I will!"

Dean sighed and knelt down in the mess of milk and cereal pieces. It only took him about ten minutes to clean it all up, but it was miserable work. He was feeling better, sure, but every time he bent his head too low, he could feel everything pounding. His nose, eyes, and mouth leaked when he stayed like that for too long, so he kept having to tilt his head back and pinch the bridge of his nose until the headache went away.

He took more of the medicine Doctor Jones gave him. It wasn't that he necessarily trusted her, but he knew she was a real doctor and that the medicine had actually helped him. And he wasn't about to go looking a gift horse in the mouth when he needed to be at his best to take care of Sammy.

He wished Dad was there. He wished Dad was done hunting that thing out on the outskirts of town so they could get in the car and go back to being together. Those were the best times—when they were all in the car and Dean got to pick the music sometimes and Sammy would fall asleep in the backseat while Dean and Dad talked about where they were going next.

But even if Dad was there, they wouldn't get out of this that easy. Dean knew what was at the grocery store, and when Dad got home, they were going to have to hunt that, too.

The worst part? Dean had to go back there now. Sammy had run them out of milk and cereal, and that was really all Dean had planned for their meals for a little while, at least until he was feeling up to actually cooking again.

At least he still had some leftover money. It was a good thing he hadn't had to spend the last of his cash on medicines.

He finished cleaning up Sammy's mess, threw away all the tissue paper bits and paper towels, then made his way to the bathroom. "Sammy?" he called as he knocked on the door.

He could hear splashing and giggling. Sammy had a new toy from Uncle Bobby for Christmas: an army man with a parachute. The kid always took a bath with that thing, and he liked to pretend he was storming some battlefield somewhere. "Here come the planes!" Sammy shouted, and Dean could hear even more splashing.

"Sammy?" he tried again.

"What?"

"I'm going to go get some more cereal. Are you okay here for a little while?"

"I'm a big boy. I can take care of myself."

"Okay. Make sure you get out of there soon, okay? I don't want you turning into a raisin," Dean said. He didn't plan to be gone long enough to let Sammy get too wrinkly, but then, with the ghost in that store, there was no telling.

Dean made sure to lay out some new clothes for Sammy, and he found some good cartoons for his brother to watch, just in case the kid ever got done playing war games. He locked the door and checked to make sure everything was in place, the salt lines unbroken, before he headed out.

Of course, things really weren't going his way at all that day.

There were police everywhere. Dean shouldn't have been surprised, of course. He'd known that whatever was in the store got what it wanted when it stopped making the lights flicker. But it was going to make getting cereal and milk that much harder. He wondered if there was anywhere else he could go to pick up the supplies when he saw something else.

There they were. The two doctors. Smith and Jones. Doctor Smith was talking to the police animatedly, using his hands way too much and looking excited about something.

He growled and felt his fists clench. He'd known they were following him before, and now they were here again. He was frustrated, he was tired, and he'd had enough of this, so he stalked over there and pounded on Doctor Smith's side when he was done talking to the cops. "What are you doing here?" he demanded.

Doctor Smith turned and looked, strangely, delighted to see Dean there. He stooped down and grinned. "Hello again! Glad to see you're on the case, too."

"I'm not," Dean said. "I just need milk."

"You didn't get some last night?"

"Sammy dumped it all out." Dean didn't know why he was telling this doctor all those things. He was usually much more reserved than that. And plus, he didn't like doctors. But there was something different about these two. He glared at them both. "And what are you two doing here? You hunters too?"

"Far from it," Doctor Jones said, and she looked offended. That happened sometimes. Grown-ups didn't understand how cool it was to be a hunter, how awesome it was to be a hero like his dad. They were mostly just jealous.

"What happened here?" Dean asked. He was trying to see past Doctor Smith, but the huge, brown coat made seeing a little difficult.

"Something in there killed the girl at the counter," Doctor Smith said.

Dean raised his eyebrows. It wasn't that he was surprised to hear that the girl was dead; he figured that something like this would happen. He was just mostly surprised to hear a grown-up tell him something like that. Most of them thought that Dean was too little to handle that kind of stuff, even though Dean had been handling it since he was Sammy's age. This doctor was definitely different.

"I bet I know what it is," Dean said at last.

"I'm not surprised," Doctor Smith said. "Would you like to help us out, tell us about it?"

Dean frowned. That definitely wasn't what most grown-ups said. They definitely didn't ask for his help, and they definitely didn't think he could handle things on his own. "Well," he said slowly, "I guess you could help me." He frowned. "But you have to do things my way. You can't come to my place, and you have to do what I say." He paused, then added, "And I'm going to need two boxes of Froot Loops."


	4. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Four

A/N: Tuesday nights are officially my nights for updating this. Even when it's technically Wednesday morning now...

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

He forgot the first rule of dealing with Dean Winchester: Sammy comes first.

The Doctor had been hoping to get right down to business, to figure out what was happening in this store and make sure it didn't hurt any more people.

But Froot Loops and breakfast came first.

Dean made them sit outside the motel room; they still weren't allowed inside. He made them wait for Sammy to finish eating and then wait for Dean to finish the dishes. He made them wait for the brothers to stop their morning routine, made them wait until Sammy was safely seated in front of the television before he even thought about coming outside. And even when he came out, slowly, he was still clutching the shotgun like he didn't trust them.

"Okay," Dean said, "let's talk."

"How's your brother?" Martha asked.

"Fine. He's watching cartoons. He should be okay for a couple hours," Dean said. But the Doctor could see that Dean was just itching to go back in that room, to make sure that Sam was okay. He kept glancing back at the window to make sure that Sam was comfortable, that his brother would not need anything while he was talking to these strangers.

The Doctor gave Dean his best, winning smile. "He'll be just fine, I'm sure. At least he's not the sick one." (Don't think the Doctor hadn't noticed the way Dean was still sniffling and coughing. The kid was not at his best; he was just trying to put on a brave face.)

"I'm fine, too," Dean said.

"Sure you are." The Doctor eyed this kid. It helped to think of him as the little teenager who helped save those kids before and in his future. He'd been like this then, too. But it was hard not to just see innocent little eyes, pudgy hands, a dripping nose, and a shotgun.

The Doctor had been a father before. A grandfather, even. It was one of the things he missed about Gallifrey when he left—the kids he would play with. And his brother's kids and his daughter's kids and everyone would tackle him and pull his hair—he wore it long back then. They would always be so frustrated, his family. He was supposed to grow up and be like _them_. But he never did, so they sent him to play with the kids.

And if Dean hadn't been holding a gun, if he hadn't been so paranoid and scared, the Doctor would have brought them both in the TARDIS. He still had toys. Susan's, mostly, but some of his own. He kept everything—it was a problem. He had armies of army men and legions of toy submarines, and he had noticed Sam playing with those before. And Dean should learn to ride a bike. That was a childlike thing to do, and the Doctor wasn't sure if he'd learned it yet. Might interfere with gun practice.

But Dean didn't want their pity or their charity—so he said. So the Doctor didn't try to play or make jokes. Dean wanted to be a grown-up; that itself was a tragedy, but a tragedy to be addressed while making sure no one else died. Priorities.

"How come you know so much about this stuff?" Martha asked when Dean made them cross a couple streets and arrive at a park separately. "Regular little soldier, you are."

Dean just beamed at her. "Thanks."

Martha frowned. She hadn't meant it as a compliment, but now she wasn't sure how to react.

"My dad and I have been hunting monsters since Sammy was a baby," Dean explained. He drew himself up to his full height and thrust out his chin for good measure. "I know lotsa stuff most grown-ups don't know about."

Martha didn't answer, just looked at the gun poking out from the top of his backpack. He'd finally agreed to put it away when they were meeting in public, but it bothered both the Doctor and Martha that it was there just the same.

"Do you know what was in the grocery store?" the Doctor asked.

"It's hard to know for sure," Dean said. He was using what the Doctor called the "big boy" voice—the voice kids used when they were about to sound smart. He reached into his bag and pulled out a few things: some shotgun shells, a water bottle, a wrench, a matchbook. "Safest bet is it's a ghost, but if it's a demon, we'll have to call my dad. That's too big for me to take on."

The Doctor glanced at Martha, and she looked back at him. They'd seen witches before, sure, but they weren't really . . . they were beings from another planet, using technology and psychic abilities. And the Doctor, well, he'd never put much stock in stuff like this. Even with the rawhead before, at least that had been a creature he'd heard about since the Silurians walked the Earth, a relic of Earth history. But demons and ghosts and magic? He'd never believed in that.

"You know that stuff's not real, right?" Martha asked slowly.

Dean gave Martha one look—one look that summed her up in his eyes—and turned to the Doctor. "I thought you two were smart. Guess not. I'll take care of this myself." He turned to grab his bag, but he looked scared, and the Doctor could tell he wanted them there.

"You've never done a case on your own, have you?" the Doctor asked quietly.

Dean froze. His hand hovered over the bag, but he was able to recover quickly enough. "Your friend thinks I can handle myself just fine," he said. (The Doctor tried not to notice that, since Martha had discounted Dean's version of reality, Dean had stopped treating her like part of the conversation.)

"I never said you weren't ready," the Doctor said. "I just . . . ." He waved his hands and tried a new approach. "Look, I'm just really thrilled you're willing to let us help on your first solo mission."

That definitely got a big smile out of Dean. Right. Things hadn't changed much in the few years since the Doctor last saw Dean—or, at least, Dean wasn't going to change much. He still thought he had to prove himself to everyone, was still afraid that he was going to let everyone down just the same.

"If you're gonna help," Dean said, a little more encouraged now that the Doctor had given him the lead, "you've gotta believe me."

"Sure. Why not?" the Doctor said with a shrug. He'd seen things that couldn't be explained before, and maybe this was just some new phenomenon Dean called ghosts and demons and the Doctor could set him straight on the matter. Or maybe the Doctor could learn something new. Either way would be fun.

Dean nodded, then turned to look at Martha like he'd just now noticed she was there. "I know you think you know everything cuz you're a lady doctor," he said, "but you should listen to me." He sniffled and wiped his nose. "Me and my dad do this all the time."

Martha's expression softened when she saw him cough into his sleeve, and while he was distracted throwing away his tissue, she leaned over to the Doctor. "Think he's telling the truth? Is there really a ghost in there?"

"He seems to think there is," the Doctor said. "And unless we find out otherwise, I say we just let him carry on thinking he's right. He's only eight."

"Going on twenty-one," Martha shot back.

The Doctor waved his hand. "Oh, he's always been like that. Or at least, he always will be."

Dean came back to the table, clutching a roll of toilet tissue he'd produced from his bag of tricks like it was a precious gift. Poor guy must have been feeling awful.

"So," Martha said. (She was trying to win back Dean's respect—she'd only barely had it when she nursed him back to health before, and now it was gone again.) "Tell us what you've got here."

Dean tilted his head at her to study her, then grinned. "Right. Okay. So get this." He leaned forward over his little possessions. "Salt works on both demons and ghosts. Hurt demons, makes ghosts go away for a while. You can fill some shotgun shells with it, and that's even better."

The Doctor felt a little better about the gun now. Only a little. A teeny bit. Maybe just a smidge. Barely enough to be noticeable kind of better.

Dean held up the water bottle. "If it's a demon, I've got some holy water, but not much. If that's what we're up against, you're on your own."

Martha frowned but didn't say anything.

Now, Dean held up the wrench. "Iron works on ghosts, too." He picked up the matchbook. "And once you figure out who they are, you kill 'em by salting and burning the bones."

"Whoa whoa whoa," the Doctor said. "who said we're killing anything?"

Dean wrinkled his nose at him. "Like we're going to get fuzzy with the ghosts."

"Maybe we can reason with it, find out what it wants," Martha said, and the Doctor nodded his agreement.

Dean clicked his tongue at them both. "Yeah, that's what you'd say, isn't it?" He shook his head. "That's not how spirits work. Especially not angry spirits."

"And you'd know better?" Martha asked.

"Of course I do." Dean rolled his eyes at her. "Look, angry spirits, they don't _do _logic. They can't let go of their lives here, and whatever it is keeping them here—anger, hate, whatever—it makes them worse. Lots worse."

"So you find out what's keeping them here. There's still no need to kill them."

Dean pressed his lips tight, but he decided not to press the issue. "Fine. Whatever. We figure out what's keeping it here before we do anything else." He paused, smiled, then said, "That means you two are assigned to do research. Have fun at the local library!" He smiled, gathered his things, shoved everything into his little backpack, then nodded his goodbyes to the both of them.

"Wait; aren't you coming with us?" Martha asked. She sounded, for the first time, a little bit small, a little bit uncertain. And it was hard to blame her. This kid seemed so sure that he knew what he was dealing with, and if he was right . . . well, even the Doctor had his doubts about true evil and what it could create.

But if Dean could tell Martha would feel better with him there, he didn't let on. He just shook his head and looked back towards the motel. "I can't leave my brother alone all day. Come and meet up with me about ten o'clock tonight; he's usually asleep by then, and besides, hunting is really a nighttime sport." He tried to look brave when he said that, like he was just giving orders like it was something he did all the time. But the Doctor could see his little fists clench and unclench. He was even more scared than Martha was.

But he kept glancing back to the motel. Even with this new hunt, these strange people who had tracked him down and questioned him, it was always about Sammy.

It was the first rule of dealing with Dean Winchester: Sammy came first.


	5. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Five

A/N: Yes, writing little!Dean is both heartbreaking and fun at the same time cuz he's so adorable and so not a little kid at the same time. :( Anyway, we're here on Tuesday again, and I promised weekly updates, and I am on it! :)

Disclaimer: I do not own any of the rights or related rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or anything like that.

...

The strangers weren't so bad.

Dean knew that he was breaking the rules, of course, knew that there was no way Dad was going to let him get away with any of this.

There was, of course, the fact that he didn't really know either of these doctors and the fact that they were probably other hunters—though why other hunters would play dumb, Dean would never know. Dad didn't like him getting involved with hunters he didn't know, and what's more, he didn't like Dean talking to strangers. Strangers could be demons, monsters in disguise. And he wasn't supposed to risk it.

Then there was the fact that Dean wasn't supposed to work a case on his own. Ever. He wasn't supposed to branch out anywhere without Dad, and he definitely wasn't supposed to take the lead in a case.

But the thing that Dad would definitely tear him a new one for was the fact that he'd left Sammy alone for so long.

That was the one thing he wasn't supposed to do. Ever. He wasn't supposed to leave Sammy alone, wasn't supposed to let him be exposed to evil. He wasn't supposed to tell Sammy about hunting or monsters or anything else. Sammy was supposed to be innocent and normal and all the good things that Dean wasn't allowed to be because he was too busy being a good soldier and a shield for his little brother. And that was okay; Dean would have done that even if Dad hadn't asked.

But these doctors were good people. He didn't know how he knew it, but they hadn't tried to kill him yet, and that had to count for something. So maybe it would be okay to break the rules just a little bit.

And besides, it wasn't like Sammy was safe there. If there was an angry spirit on the loose, there was no telling if it would come after Sammy or not, and then where would Dad be? He'd be worse than when he lost Mom because he'd be stuck with just Dean, and of course that wasn't enough to be a real family.

Dean reloaded his gun as quietly as he could. Doctor Smith said that he wasn't supposed to kill the ghost, but he had other plans. Once he figured out who this angry spirit was, he was headed straight for the nearest cemetery. He'd bring Doctor Jones with him as backup; maybe if she actually saw an angry spirit or was nearly killed by one she would stop treating him like he was some stupid, backwards kid.

That was the worst part about grown-ups. They thought that anything that had to do with imagination was childish, that they were better than it. So when Dean was still too little to understand that hunting was not something he was supposed to talk about in school, he had mentioned ghosts to his teachers, and they got concerned. They told him that he was too big to be living in dream worlds and that he needed to stop believing in fantasy.

Doctor Jones was like those grown-ups. She wanted Dean to think about science and doctor things.

But the other doctor, Doctor Smith—he was cool. He didn't treat Dean like he was four years old, not like other grown-ups did. And he actually listened when Dean talked, and he respected Dean's knowledge. He treated Dean like a hunter.

No, it was more than that.

He treated Dean like a person.

Maybe that was why he was willing to break the rules. No one had ever treated Dean like he mattered before. Obviously, this guy hadn't been in enough hunts to know how completely useless he was. Sure, he was a good shot, but he was small and an easy target, and he wasn't any good at hunting on his own. The only stuff he'd seen was when Dad would pull off to the side of a road chasing phantoms.

But Doctor Smith still treated him like he was important, and Dean liked the idea that maybe someone hadn't been hurt by him yet.

So when the doctors showed up in the parking lot, as he instructed, Dean ran out to meet them and tried to pretend he wasn't enjoying this.

"What did you find out?" he asked. He tried not to pant, but it was actually really hard to run when his head still felt like it was going to explode from all the gunk trapped in it. But he tried not to let on that he didn't feel that good because he wanted them to take him on the hunt. His dad would be back any night, after all, and he didn't want to miss this one shot.

Doctor Jones smiled at him and handed him a couple sheets of paper.

Dean turned them over in his hands. There wasn't much substance to this research, and he wondered how much time they spent even gathering this much. All they had was a couple articles about a cashier who was killed by an armed robber a few years ago.

"Is this it?" he asked.

"What? You wanted more?" Doctor Smith asked, laughing. "I think this is the person we're looking for, at any rate—if it is really a spirit of somebody and not something else."

When Doctor Smith said that, when the Doctor expressed his doubts, it wasn't the way Doctor Jones did it. Doctor Jones said it like it was obvious that science was the only way and that anything supernatural was for babies. But when Doctor Smith said it, it was more like he just thought that there were a zillion different explanations and he was more comfortable with the one that didn't involve the supernatural. But he wasn't ruling that idea out, either. He was the first grown-up to give Dean a shot at changing his ideas of the world, and Dean found that he was really starting to like Doctor Smith.

"Did you find out where she was buried? Who the robber was?" Dean pressed. "Were there any other deaths in the area? How did she die?"

"She was stabbed," Doctor Smith said quietly. He looked worried, but maybe that was because he was the one who found the body before, and it had all the markings of a stabbing, too. Maybe he was just worried because Dean's world was starting to make more sense than the world he was still clinging to.

"Right. So let's find the bones and torch them," Dean said. He pulled out the matchbook from his backpack and grinned. "Looks like it was a ghost after all."

"I thought I told you we weren't killing anything unless we have to," Doctor Smith insisted.

"Let's be honest. We're not killing ghosts if they're already dead. We're just helping them to let go of this life—whatever that means." Dean shook his head. These people were really awful at hunting, weren't they?

"Let's at least find out for ourselves what's happening."

"It's your funeral," Dean muttered. But he kept going anyway, even though he knew it was dangerous. These idiots were going to get themselves killed, and Dean liked the doctors too much to let that happen.

So he followed them into the grocery store. This was a small town, so it wasn't open later than ten o'clock. (Dean couldn't remember the last time he had even seen a twenty-four hours store, much less been inside one.) That meant, of course, that everyone was gone and the place was nice and dark and empty for them when they got there.

Dean hated the dark. He pretended he didn't because Sammy was scared of the dark and the things in his closet, but Dean wasn't supposed to be scared, so he never told Dad that he'd been scared of the dark since he was three.

He kept his flashlight close, and he tried his very hardest not to grab Doctor Jones's hand—especially because it looked like she was going to offer it to him to keep him safe, and she had done a good job taking care of him before, so why not now, too?

But he was the hunter, and not these two, so he was supposed to be brave. So instead, in a small, barely audible voice, he said, "You know, if this place is too scary for you, you can hold my hand if you really want to."

Doctor Jones smiled really big at him, like she had been waiting for him to ask. She reached out and offered her hand to Dean, and he took it and tried to play it off with a casual shrug and a comment about what a pretty lady doctor she was. (She didn't buy it.)

Dean was trying to pretend now that he wasn't shaking. He tried to play that one off, too, by wiping his nose and putting a fake cough in his elbow. But he'd never been hunting on his own before, and definitely not with two idiots who didn't even know enough to salt and burn the bones before walking into the ghosts' lair.

All in all, Dean could probably have picked a better place for his first solo mission. And better partners. He should have waited until Sammy was a teenager before he struck out on his own. Then Sammy could have shared the rush with him.

He missed his little brother. They hadn't been apart for this long before, and he was really starting to notice the difference. Maybe they could hook up one of those baby monitor things you could hear from miles away just so Dean could be sure nothing was happening back at the motel room. That was where he was supposed to be—where he _needed _to be—not off playing hero with some doctors.

Doctor Smith turned to look at him with his head tilted to one side. He frowned, whipped off his glasses, then looked Dean in the eye. (That was also something other grown-ups didn't do, so points to Doctor Smith.) "Don't worry about your brother. He'll be fine."

Dean frowned again. He liked Doctor Smith, but the guy had practically read his mind, and he knew from experience that knowing too much was definitely a bad thing. He pulled his hand out of Martha's, frowned once more, then muttered, "I know. I've left all the protections in place around the room. I just worry he'll get lonely." He didn't ask why Doctor Smith knew this stuff; he didn't really want to know.

"You just had your Worried About Sammy face on; that's all," Doctor Smith muttered.

Dean was about to give up on the mission entirely and go running back to Sammy to make sure he was really okay and this weird doctor who knew too much hadn't done anything to hurt him. But then the whole room got cold, and Dean stopped dead in his tracks.

He had his shotgun out before Doctor Smith could tell him that there was really no need for weapons—and boy, was that doctor fond of telling him _that_ over and over again—and leveled it at the nearest moving thing. There she was—a girl in a cashier's uniform with blood running down her middle and her hand stretched out like she wanted to take Dean.

_Bam_.

It was a good thing his father had taken him shooting so many times.


	6. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Six

A/N: After tonight's episode (if you haven't seen it, just . . . no words), I thought I might post a new chapter to help siphon off some feels. The writing energy and hype of feels had to go somewhere, so I made it productive!

Disclaimer: I don't own Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

The Doctor winced at the sound of the gunshot behind him, then turned just in time to see something new.

There was a girl standing there, just floating in the middle of the air. And when Dean shot her, her entire form exploded into little pieces of energy and gas and waves that, even as Dean reloaded, struggled to reform.

The Doctor put his glasses back on; this was definitely out of the ordinary. He was glad Dean had introduced him to it.

"Hello there," he said with his widest grin as the girl reformed. "Aren't you a beauty?"

Dean glanced over at him with a look that clearly said he thought the Doctor was insane. (Actually, that was par for the course. Most people gave him that look when he met new things. But that was how humans were. They didn't seem to think new things were as exciting as he did. Something about the fear of the unknown. It really was such a bore.)

The girl pieced herself back together, and the Doctor heard Dean cock his gun, ready for another shot. But the Doctor held up a hand. "Wait," he said. "Let's see what she does."

"Your funeral," Dean said again. He kept the gun leveled at the girl, though, just to be sure.

"Hello," the Doctor said. He moved forward and wondered if he could put forward his hand, if she was solid enough to shake it. "I'm the Doctor."

The girl looked at him like she was seeing him for the first time, tilted her head at him. Then, she looked up at the alarm system wiring above her. She frowned and narrowed her eyes at him.

"Oh yeah, sorry about that," the Doctor said with what he hoped was his best, most winning, most convincing grin. "I had to turn that off so no one would come snooping. We didn't want anyone to get hurt. I can turn it back on if you want."

But there was really no talking with her. She charged right at him, with both hands outstretched, until she had her fingernails in the skin right below his ribcage.

"Look out!" Dean shouted, and there was another loud blast.

The girl dissipated into the air again, and then little Dean was crouched over the Doctor. He could feel pudgy fingers groping around, trying to find where the Doctor was hurt. He wouldn't have made a half bad doctor, come to think of it. The kid knew exactly where to look.

"Okay, we're going to have to get you out of here," Dean said. He had been completely terrified just seconds before, but now, with someone to protect, with a purpose and a goal in mind, he was in his element. He was born to do this.

"What, and leave that fascinating creature behind? We hardly know anything about it!" the Doctor said. He pulled himself up and gently pushed Dean off. "Besides, she didn't get me too badly. I'll be just fine."

"You sure?" Dean wrinkled his nose at the Doctor.

"Trust me; we've seen much worse," Martha assured him. She reached out for his hand again, but he didn't need it anymore. That was Dean, though—he didn't think he needed anybody, even though that was exactly his purpose in life.

"Okay." Dean eyed the Doctor as he steadied himself. "But if you're going to keep going, you've got to listen to me. I thought we agreed you were going to play by my rules."

"Yeah, but not if your rules involve killing!" The Doctor shook his head; he forgot how stubborn Dean could be.

"You tried talking to it. How'd that turn out for you?" Dean shot right back. "My way works better."

"Your way is more dangerous."

"Says you." Dean frowned and refused to put away the shotgun, but at that point, that was to be expected. The Doctor was just getting used to his stubborn new friend.

The girl reformed and glared at Dean, then at Martha, but she kept turning her attention back to the Doctor. She glared at him, stretched her fingers, but she realized that Dean and his shot gun would be a problem, would interfere with getting to the Doctor.

"Why's she after you, anyway?" Dean asked through gritted teeth. The girl disappeared and then reappeared behind him, but Dean turned just fast enough to scare her away again.

"Haven't you worked it out?" the Doctor asked. He pulled out his sonic to see if he could find a setting that would work on the girl, something that would immobilize her long enough to explain the situation to her rather than blow her to smithereens like Dean was determined to do.

Dean frowned at the Doctor. The girl appeared behind him again, and Martha gasped, moved forward to try and help, but the girl wasn't after Dean. She was after the gun. She dug her long nails into Dean's hands, and he should have dropped the gun.

Instead, he just glared at the girl and swung the barrel around. It passed right through her, and she let go of him.

"Are you okay?" Martha asked. She sounded shocked, appalled that anyone could hurt Dean. She knelt down in front of him to examine his bleeding hands, but he jerked away.

"I'm fine. Part of the job," he said through gritted teeth, but the Doctor could see that he was trying his best not to cry. He didn't want them to think he was no good at hunting, after all. But, to take attention off of himself, Dean looked back up at the Doctor. "What did you mean? What haven't I worked out yet?"

"We gave you information about this girl. What do you think she wants?"

"To kill people and hurt them the way they hurt her?" Dean offered.

The Doctor shook his head. "You're thinking too small."

Dean rolled his eyes and shook his head like he couldn't believe the Doctor would force him to think in the middle of a fight for their lives. (Meanwhile, the girl had appeared around him, but Martha had apparently changed her mind about ghosts and had grabbed the wrench out of Dean's bag of tricks to have his back. She was determined not to let him get hurt again.) He shook his head, looked down, then sighed. "Okay, so she was shot by a robber, right?"

"There you go."

"So she's got a thing about robbers?" Dean offered. He wrinkled his nose. "But if that's true, why would he go after the cashier last night?" He shrugged. "Unless she's reliving her own death through other people?"

"Not quite," the Doctor said. "You were right the first time. She's trying to protect the store."

"So why's she going after you?"

The Doctor grinned and held up his sonic. "Well," he said, "I might have played with the alarm settings in the store to make sure we would be undisturbed while we worked."

Dean raised both his eyebrows, but then he was distracted by the girl again.

The Doctor frowned. He still hadn't been able to find a setting that could affect this . . . whatever this girl was made out of. And what's worse, she had already gone after Dean—had hurt an eight-year-old and scared him to death. He could see it in Martha's face; maybe it was about time they changed tactics and tried things Dean's way.

But one chance. He had to give her a chance.

So, the next time the girl appeared, hovering near Dean and trying to get at him before he blasted her again, the Doctor stepped in the way. "Hello," he said cheerily, trying an even bigger smile and hoping that would help change her mind about him. "Sorry we got off on a bit of a wrong foot there, but I think you and I have a misunderstanding."

The girl snarled, and the sound that came out of her mouth was completely inhuman—terrifying and pitiful at the same time. She rushed forward, her hands outstretched, her fingernails sharpened, and the Doctor jumped back with a yelp as her fingers just barely missed his stomach and the important organs in there.

"Hey!" Dean shouted. "Leave him alone." His shout distracted the ghost long enough for Martha to take a swing at her with the wrench.

As Martha watched the girl disappear into little wisps of something like smoke, she looked down at the wrench and smiled. "I think I'm getting the hang of this," she said.

"Yeah, you're not so bad," Dean said. It was a big compliment, coming from a kid who only a little while ago thought Martha was completely useless to his world of ghosts and demons.

Martha grinned after him, then yelped in surprise when the girl appeared suddenly behind her. The girl's hand was sticking through the other side of Martha's abdomen, and she made a strange choking noise.

"Don't worry, Doctor Jones," Dean said. He rushed forward to help, but the girl was done playing nice. She held out her hand, and Dean went flying, crashing into the wall and knocking over a couple shelves worth of fruit.

Martha's mouth opened and closed, but no sound came out. Tears sprang to her eyes, and the Doctor leaped forward, now desperate.

"We're not trying to hurt you," the Doctor said. "We're not here to rob the store. We came here to find you and to help you."

The girl turned to the Doctor with a sneer. She opened her hand, and the Doctor felt some invisible force throw him backwards. He hit his head and saw stars for a few seconds before he scrambled up.

Dean had the shotgun in his hands; the Doctor could see the wrench. They both moved at the same time, and when Dean shot the ghost, the Doctor grabbed the wrench and held it above Martha like a shield.

Martha, now free of the ghost, collapsed in a heap, and the Doctor just barely caught her before she hit the ground. "Are you alright?" he asked.

Martha nodded. She looked up at Dean and smiled. "Nice shot."

Dean tried not to act too proud as he shrugged. "I pulled a little to the right." But he was a little more concerned with the Doctor than he was with Martha's compliments, and he wheeled on the Doctor, waving his shotgun above his head. "What did I tell you? I told you they couldn't be reasoned with and you were just going to get yourselves killed."

"But she wasn't trying to hurt any innocent bystanders, just cashiers who skim from the register and doctors who interfere with the alarm system," the Doctor said. "Can't we help her keep the store safe without hurting her?"

Dean rolled her eyes. "Angry. Spirit," he said as if that was all the explanation he needed to give. "People who stayed too long and lost their sense of what it means to be human."

The girl appeared again in front of the Doctor, her eyes wild, and he swung at her out of instinct. As he watched her disappear into smoke, he frowned. "Yeah, I'm starting to see what you mean."


	7. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Seven

A/N: I've been falling a bit behind in my writing on all fronts, including some Real Life books that I definitely want to get written. But I've got a couple chapters in my back pocket that should hold us over for a few weeks until I get my life on track :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or anything related to that.

...

It took Dean forever to get the two doctors out of the store. Doctor Smith kept trying to reason with the ghost, and Doctor Jones kept telling her partner that it was hopeless and they should really be on their way. It was the first time Dean found himself agreeing with Doctor Jones instead of Doctor Smith.

Once he finally got them to the parking lot, and once Doctor Smith closed the doors nice and tight with that little blue glowy stick of his that apparently could work magic with technology, he collapsed on the curb and looked down at his hands.

Dad was gonna kill him.

It wasn't like he could pass off his hands as an accident. There were clear fingernail marks, and the scratches were shaped like fingers. He reached into his backpack for the bandages he had –thankfully—remembered to bring and started wrapping.

"Here. Let me help you with that," Doctor Jones said. She knelt down in front of him and, wordlessly, unwrapped and examined his hand before she put new bandages on. She seemed to do all the real doctoring between the two of them.

"Does it hurt?" Doctor Smith asked. He had finally recovered his breath and knelt down in front of Dean beside Doctor Jones.

"Naw," Dean said. He tried to smile, but his eyes decided to cry all by themselves.

Doctor Smith laughed and pulled out the roll of tissue paper Sammy had given him. He pulled off a couple squares and handed them to Dean so he could wipe his eyes and nose. "Of course you're fine," Doctor Smith said.

"So, are we gonna do things my way now?" Dean asked. He figured that was a good time to ask. Grown-ups were usually more willing to give Dean what he asked for when he looked sad and pitiful. He didn't usually play the pity card, but Doctor Jones in particular looked like she wanted to take him out for ice cream or something. He could use ice cream. Or pie.

Doctor Smith frowned. He looked behind him at the store and then back at Dean and Martha. He saw the way Martha was still holding her stomach, still waiting for everything to settle down in there after being rearranged. He saw the bandages on Dean's hands. Finally, he sighed. "She's had her chance. What is it you want to do?"

Dean grinned. "Ghosts only stick around if they've got something keeping them here—usually their body, sometimes hair and stuff like that. Did you find out where she was buried?"

Doctor Smith nodded.

"Great. Let's get over there before she realizes what we're up to," Dean said. "It'll be way hard to salt and burn her bones if she shows up and starts making trouble."

"Right. Because she wasn't making trouble for us before," Doctor Jones muttered. (Dean was starting to like her again, even if she treated him like a kid and didn't believe in the supernatural.)

Dean just grinned at her. "Okay, so where are we going?" he asked, turning back to Doctor Smith.

Doctor Smith pointed in the general direction of the main road. "It's the only cemetery in the area. It shouldn't be hard to spot if we start walking that way."

"Walking?" Dean wrinkled his nose. "Didn't you drive here?"

Both of the doctors laughed. "Well," Doctor Smith said—he said that word differently than other people did, like he wanted it to last longer than all the other words—"my . . . ah . . . transportation is parked over on the other side of the neighborhood."

"You walked here?"

"Exercise is good for you!" Doctor Smith said. Like that was an explanation.

Dean frowned. There was a lot about these two doctors that he didn't understand. He didn't like it. They seemed to know things—especially Doctor Smith. And Doctor Jones knew a lot more about medicine than he thought she was supposed to for being so young, and let's not forget the fact that they were definitely not from around there and should not have been in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the United States. They really had no business being there, and Dean knew when this was all over, he was going to attack them with questions.

But there wasn't time for that. He didn't have time to complain about the fact that the doctors were too mysterious for him to be totally comfortable around them. If they were going to walk the length of the town, dig up a grave, and salt and burn the bones before the sun came up and people starting waking up and seeing what they were up to, well, they had to get going.

Dean led the way, walking fast but not quite jogging, while Martha kept up behind him at about her regular pace. The Doctor probably could have kept up without the jogging, but he kept getting distracted by playing with that blue tube thingy and muttering to himself about electromagnetic whatsits and low-level psychic abilities or something like that.

But it didn't take them as long to find the cemetery as they would have expected. The town was small, and the main road passed everything. Or maybe Dean just felt like it didn't take as long because Doctor Jones spent the whole time chatting with him.

She told him about how she met Doctor Smith (or "the Doctor" as she called him, like he was too good to go by anything but his title) in a hospital where he was pretending to be a patient to investigate a shifter.

Well, it was sort of a shifter. It was some kind of weird vampire-shifter hybrid thing who used straws for dramatic effect. A bit campy for Dean's liking; he didn't like when monsters tried to be cool. They weren't cool. They were filthy and monsters.

"How'd he kill it? Dean asked.

Doctor Jones paused. She tilted her head at Dean. "We didn't," she said. "Someone else did. He was just there to investigate."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Typical."

Doctor Jones frowned, looked behind her at Doctor Smith, who was shaking his little blue tube thing and angrily glaring at it. She turned back to Dean and whispered, "Don't be fooled. You'd be surprised what he's capable of."

The look on Doctor Jones's face was so tired, so haunted, so sad that Dean knew she was serious. So when he looked back at the lankly, spiky-haired Doctor Smith whose shoe had come untied and whose glasses were crooked, Dean wondered if maybe the goofiness and naiveté was hiding something else. He'd never felt totally comfortable around the guy, anyway.

Doctor Jones never got to finish her story, though. They found the entrance to the cemetery pretty soon after her dark comments, and all three of them fell silent. Doctor Smith stopped playing with his tubey blue thing and looked up. "Okay, Dean," he said. "You're the expert. What do we do now?"

Dean smiled and dug into his backpack. He had basically cleaned out all the hidden tools, weapons, and other hunting gear that Dad kept around motel rooms in case of emergency. Plus, Dean had been putting together his own hunting kit since he was seven. Dad got him started—gave him a fold-up shovel for Christmas. So Dean pulled out his shovel and fixed those doctors with his patented sideways grin. "Now we find the grave, dig it up, and salt and burn the bones."

The doctors both insisted that Dean sit out the digging part. Doctor Jones wanted him not to use his hands if he could help it, but Doctor Smith . . . . Dean couldn't really place the guy's intentions. Doctor Smith took off his huge, brown coat and draped it over Dean's shoulders. "No sense in getting my best coat all sweaty and dirty," he said by way of explanation, though Dean knew he was just saying that so Dean didn't feel like he was being treated like a little kid. "Keep it warm for me?"

Dean appreciated the coat, though. It was well past his bedtime, he had been attacked and then walked the length of the town—he was barely fighting the desire to just wrap up in the blanket of a jacket and go to sleep. Dean fought off the sleepiness by propping himself up by his shotgun and watching out for the cashier ghost.

Doctor Jones was getting tired, too—Dean could tell because she was complaining out loud. "This always happens with you, doesn't it?" she said. "Go somewhere new and end up covered in dirt playing Tomb Raiders!"

"Little hard work never hurt anyone, Martha," Doctor Smith said. It was his turn to dig after Doctor Jones broke the ground. (He had tried to use the tube thingy to help dig, but it just made a lot of noise, so Dean was stuck still wondering what that whiny device did in the first place.)

Dean shook his head and laughed. "How long you two been together?"

Doctor Jones immediately tensed up. "We're not . . . we're not together," she said carefully, but her face and the way she looked at Doctor Smith said different. An inter-office romance, maybe? Dean didn't know much about girls and romance except what he learned from TV, but he knew enough. Besides, it was clear Doctor Jones didn't really want to talk about it.

"I think I found something!" Doctor Smith said a little while later. Dean was practically falling asleep by then, and he was just getting to thinking that about this time Sammy would sometimes have nightmares and climb into his bed and what would he do if Dean wasn't there when he woke up? But Dean was awake now; this was the good part.

He'd heard his dad talking about stuff like this. The good parts. The parts where the bad guy came to get him but he always escaped at the last second because he burned the bones.

But Dean was ready. He handed down the lighter and the salt to both doctors, who were now inside the grave. He was standing watch over them, ready to shoot at anything that moved.

Any second now.

"How much salt do we need to use?" Doctor Smith called up.

Dean frowned. "I don't know," he admitted. He didn't usually say stuff like that out loud. "Just use all of it to be sure."

"Okay."

Dean waited. He waited while the doctors climbed out of the grave, waited while Doctor Jones tried unsuccessfully to get the lighter started. Still there was no sign of the cashier ghost.

The lighter started, the bones burned. Nothing happened.

Dean frowned. "Well, that was a disappointment."

"What? You wanted more flash, whiz, bang?" Doctor Smith teased him.

Dean shrugged. Well, at least he'd managed to survive his first hunting trip.


	8. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Eight

A/N: Taking the day to relax, write, nap, you know. Since I can't leave my house without dying; it's so icy outside.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

The Doctor was beaming after Dean the whole way back to the motel. He couldn't help it; Dean's grin was infectious.

Dean had a lot to be grinning about, though. He had managed to get through his very first solo hunt with civilians weighing him down—even though the ending was not necessarily as exciting as he would have liked.

The Doctor didn't ask for his coat back, and Dean didn't offer it. And the Doctor didn't say anything, even when the coattails were dragging in the dirt. He could see Dean shivering under there, hiding his hands in layers and layers of fabric wrapped around Martha's bandages. But if the Doctor mentioned it, he knew Dean would give it back to him, so it was best not to bring it up.

As Dean walked ahead of them, practically humming and skipping, Martha aught up to the Doctor, her voice a low whisper. "Doctor," she said, "what was that thing we just fought? It wasn't really a ghost, was it?"

The Doctor frowned. He remembered a planet orbiting a black hole and remembered what happened the last time he thought something was impossible, the last time he discounted the belief in the unexplainable. He still didn't have any answers after that incident, either. So he didn't have an answer for Martha, and he just turned to her with a shrug. "Well, he said," I've been wrong before. Who's to say Dean's truth is any less valid than ours?" He smiled after the little hunter who was waddling along under a too-big coat. "He's a clever kid, and he knew how to fight it. Who's to say he can't name it as well?"

Martha frowned, crossed her arms, and watched Dean with pursed lips. "When I started travelling with you," she said, "it was simple. Everything was science, even if I couldn't understand it."

"And ghosts can't be part of that?" the Doctor laughed.

Martha gave him the kind of smile she used to give him before he was John Smith. "It's all a bit Harry Potter, don't you think?" she asked. He grinned at their inside joke, glad that at least she had forgiven him enough to start loosening up and laughing with him again. Good. It had been two weeks of walking on eggshells, and that was exhausting.

Dean hung back and waited for the Doctor and Martha to catch up. He was grinning broadly now, and he reached out to take Martha's hand. "Did you see the look on that ghost's face when I blasted her with a shell full of salt?" he asked, grinning enthusiastically. "She never saw me coming!"

Martha looked uneasy for only a second before she gave in to Dean's smile and skipping steps. "You're an unstoppable force, you are," Martha said, laughing.

Dean beamed at her. "You weren't so bad yourself," he said—a big step up from the way he used to talk to her. And then Dean turned to the Doctor, and even though he was still smiling, his eyes weren't crinkling anymore. "You were completely useless, Doctor Smith. Sorry."

It was the "sorry" that tickled the Doctor. He laughed and shrugged easily. "I used to be a soldier—didn't suit me."

Dean stopped grinning and tilted his heart at the Doctor curiously. He glanced briefly, for some reason, at Martha, then sighed. "Yeah. I've seen it happen to some of the best."

The Doctor frowned. He didn't like how old Dean sounded, how tired and world-weary he was even when he had only been in the world for a few years. He'd grown up too fast.

Suddenly, the Doctor's head perked up, and he felt a slow grin growing in the corners of his lips. He knew _exactly _how to help Dean out, how to turn him into a kid again. "We should celebrate our success," the Doctor said.

Dean raised his eyebrows. "_Our _success?" he repeated with a frown.

The Doctor laughed. "Sorry. We should celebrate _your _success."

"And don't you forget it," Dean muttered. He sniffled, then asked, "What were you thinking, Doc? About a party?"

The Doctor tried not to bristle at the nickname. He'd forgotten that about working with Dean ;the kid seemed determined not to use anyone's given name. Sammy, Blondie, Doc, Cap . . . . He shook his head. He hadn't met that Dean yet, hadn't had all these arguments. So he sighed patiently. "Don't call me that."

Dean snorted but did not argue. This younger version was much easier to deal with.

But the Doctor still had a plan, so he just pressed on. "I'v egot some ice cream sandwiches back at the TARDIS," he said.

"TARDIS?" Dean repeated, crinkling his nose.

Martha grinned at the Doctor when she realized what he was doing, and the Doctor smiled back. "That's the transportation I was telling you about."

Dean scrunched up his nose again. "I've never heard of that model, and I know a thing or two about cars—even foreign ones." He sniffed, and it was hard to tell if that was an indignant, proud sniff or just part of his slow recovery from the sinus infection.

The Doctor smiled. "I've also got some tea that might help that fever of yours."

"Tea?" Dean sniffed again, and this was definitely not a sick kind of sniffle.

"Oi, don't knock it til you try it."

Dean seemed to consider the Doctor's offer. The Doctor could just see the internal struggle play out. Ice cream and the chance to breathe—that was a tempting offer. But then there was little Sammy to consider. Ah, yes, there it was: the Sammy frown.

"Look, you've been real nice to patch me up and help me with the cashier lady ghost, but I've got a little brother back at the—"

"Sammy's invited too," the Doctor said. "He can have all the ice cream sandwiches and Atani funnel cakes he can eat."

That was it. The clincher. The Doctor knew it, and Dean knew it, and Dean froze, his frown deepening as he tried not to smile at the idea of spoiling Sammy with some good sweets. "Not supposed to take candy from strangers," Dean said at last, weakly, but the Doctor could see his resolve crumbling. "Any fool kid knows that."

"Oh okay. That's fine," the Doctor said. "We'll just have to celebrate alone. Might have even made some apple pie."

Dean broke at last. "What kind of ice cream you got?"

Martha and the Doctor both grinned, and the Doctor said, "Oh, the usual. Chocolate, strawberry, ayanberry sherbet."

"What do you even have ice cream for?"

The Doctor shrugged. He was saving the time-travel explanation for when Dean saw the inside of the TARDIS for the first time, so this was not the time to tell him that he and Martha had gone on an ice cream binge after they spent a couple days breathing in sand in the middle of Ancient Egypt. Instead, he simply laughed and said, "Blame Martha. She's the one who insisted on strawberry."

"Only because you pick weird flavors if I leave you alone," Martha teased.

Dean frowned again. Slowly, carefully, he said, "Sammy loves chocolate . . . ." He shook his head, sighed, and finally relented. "Okay. You win. But if you try anything—anything at all—I won't hesitate to shoot you full of rock salt." A sly grin spread across his face as he added, "It won't kill you, but it oughta hurt."

Martha frowned, and the Doctor shot both eyebrows up. But then Dean was happily humming all the way down to the motel like he hadn't just threatened their lives. The sun was just rising, but Dean's exhaustion would not show through—he was too good to let anyone see him weak. He burst right through the door with a smile and declared, "Rise and shine, Sammy! I've got a special surprise for you!"

The Doctor and Martha waited patiently outside. Dean had made them swear never to set foot in the motel room, and they were trying their best to keep that uneasy truce with him. They didn't doubt that he wasn't kidding when he said he would shoot them if they crossed the line.

It took a while, but eventually, Dean emerged from the room, grinning and holding Sammy's hand behind him. Sammy was still wearing his pajamas, his hair bedraggled and his eyes red from where he kept rubbing them awake.

"Where are we going, Dean?" Sammy asked. He sounded tired, small.

The Doctor and Martha had seen Dean with Sammy, but only from far away. Up close, it was even easier to see how much they cared about each other. It was plain to see that they were attached, but it did something amazing to Dean.

It was like looking at a completely different kid. This Dean was kind, gentle. He helped Sammy over the little step up to the motel room, helped him through the parking lot, held his hand tight to make sure he would not get run over by any cars—even though the parking lot was definitely empty.

"We're gonna get some ice cream," Dean said, grinning.

"Did Dad give you some money?"

The Doctor saw it—the slight hesitation. But Sammy didn't see it. He just saw Dean smile, shrug, and say, "I didn't steal it, if that's what you're asking."

"Okay." Sammy just held tighter to Dean's hand. He didn't usually get to go outside his motel room; that much was obvious by the way he clung tightly to Dean and looked like something might jump out at him. (The Doctor couldn't help wondering how much he really knew about what Dean and his father did.)

The Doctor grinned when he saw Sammy. He crouched down and offered his hand. "Hello there. I'm the Doctor."

Instead of reaching for the proffered hand, Sammy just grasped Dean's tighter and looked to his big brother for help. Dean smiled and gave a slight nod, and Sammy reached out with a squeak. "Hi," he said simply.

"Do you know what a hero your brother is?" the Doctor asked.

Dean looked mortified, but Sammy just smiled. "Of course I do. He's my big brother!"

Dean stopped looking mortified; now, he just looked pleased. "A hero," he whispered to himself. The Doctor could tell he liked the sound of that.

With the practiced care of a father, the Doctor swept both boys up onto his shoulders—Dean on one shoulder and Sammy on the other. Sammy giggled with excitement, and Dean just grinned at his brother.

"Where are we going?" Sammy asked.

"We're gonna go see a new kind of car," Dean said.

Sammy frowned. "Cars are boring."

"Are not!" Dean said, and the reaction was so strong that he almost fell off the Doctor's shoulders.

"Are so. That's all you ever talk about," Sammy insisted.

The two brothers went on like that for the entire walk to the TARDIS, so distracted by teasing each other that they did not notice they stopped until they were looking right at her, his beautiful TARDIS.

"That's not a car," Sammy said.

"Thanks, Sherlock," Dean said. He slid down off the Doctor's shoulder easily and stared up at the big, blue box. "Why'd you take us here?"

The Doctor just smiled. "Why don't you open her up and find out?"


	9. Book One: Stranger, Chapter Nine

A/N: This is the LAST CHAPTER OF BOOK ONE. I'll have Book Two next week, and we'll go on a whole new adventure!

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Doctor Who or Supernatural.

...

"Dean," Sammy tugged on Dean's sleeve, his jaw wide open. "Dean, it must be magic. It's bigger on the inside."

Dean felt his entire body tense up. He felt his fingers curl around the shotgun, felt his hand on the unused flask of holy water. "Sammy, we should get out of here," Dean whispered. He _knew _there was something off about those doctors. He didn't know what they were, but they clearly were not human.

Doctor Smith, who had been grinning at Sammy's awed reaction, frowned when he saw Dean's wide eyes and tensed muscles. "It's not magic or voodoo or whatever you might think," he said quickly.

"Yeah, well, you would say that," Dean muttered. "What is this place? Why did you want us to come here?"

At that, Doctor Smith's smile returned. "It's called the TARDIS. T-A-R-D-I-S. It stands for Time and Relative Dimensions in Space."

"A time machine?" Sammy had at first been shrinking back into Dean when he saw his brother's reaction to the TARDIS. But now he was smiling again. "A time machine, Dean," he repeated, awe-struck.

Dean was stuck. His brother was just so excited and happy—maybe he should play along and not scare him. He grinned; besides, this was just like an episode of Star Trek, and that was way too cool to pass up. But he was not about to let Sammy eat any ice cream until he was sure the doctors weren't, you know, witch doctors or something and that they hadn't cursed the pie. He wrinkled his nose. "Why would a time traveler want to stop here? Besides the ghost, this place is boring."

Doctor Jones backed out a laugh as she rolled her eyes in Doctor Smith's direction. "He'll tell you he's just mixing it up, but the truth is, he's a really, really bad driver."

The Doctor looked mortally offended, but Dean laughed. Slowly, carefully, he let go of the holy oil. He put his backpack down close enough that he was still able to get to it if he had to. "So," he said at last. "What do all those buttons do?"

And that was it. That was all the Doctor needed to launch into a tirade. He spun around and twirled and leaped around the big control whatsit. Dean didn't understand a word he was saying until, at last, Doctor Smith stopped. "You want to see her in action?"

Dean frowned. Of course he wanted to see. Pass up a chance to go where no one has gone before? Dean could just taste the adventures.

But then, he looked over at Sammy. He had to take care of his little brother, and there was no place for a four-year-old in time travel. And besides, who would be there for Dad when he got home tired from a hunt? Who would make sure Dad got enough sleep and enough food so he was strong enough to get back on the road? No, he couldn't leave his family, and he couldn't take them along. Sammy was too little, and Dad would shoot the doctors on sight.

So, Dean just sighed. "I can't. My family needs me right now."

Doctor Smith sighed. "Of course. Right. Same old song, I see."

Dean wasn't sure how to take Doctor Smith's reaction, but he didn't think about it for too long because Sammy and Doctor Jones emerged from the back of the TARDIS with arms full of boxes, and there was a nice apple pie perched on top of the stock.

"Well, we don't have to go anywhere in time or space, but I do have a treat if you'd like."

Dean raised both his eyebrows, but Doctor Smith didn't stop to ask permission. He just started pulling levers and pushing buttons and hitting things with a little hammer. The whole TARDIS trembled and made a weird noise like a whining growl. Dean managed to catch the pie before Sammy could drop it—and he steadied his brother with the other hand as well. The sound and shaking soon stopped, and Doctor Smith beamed. "Go ahead. Open the door—but don't step outside."

Dean ran to the door, trying very hard not to look too excited. He flung it open, careful not to step outside, just like Doctor Smith asked—and gasped in delight.

He could see the whole earth stretching out in front of him, could see the stars and the moon just beyond the warm glow of the atmosphere. He'd seen stuff like this on TV and in books, but that was nothing compared to the real thing.

He forgot about Sammy, about the shotgun, about hunting. He just sat down and let his legs dangle out the doorway.

Space.

He was really in space.

Really.

Doctor Smith came and climbed down beside him. He dangled his long legs out the door alongside Dean and draped his arm around his shoulder. "Amazing, isn't it? How big the world really is."

"There's so much down there," Dean said.

Doctor Smith nodded.

"How is my dad supposed to keep all those people safe?" Dean asked. He hadn't meant to ask it out loud, but as soon as he did, he saw Doctor Smith's entire expression change. Doctor Smith just frowned, wrapped his arms around Dean, and hugged him close. "If he's anything like you, he can handle himself just fine. Don't you worry."

Dean sniffled and tried to pretend it was just because he was still sick.

Doctor Smith led him back inside the TARDIS with one hand and, with the other, pulled the pie out of the stack and handed it to Dean. "This is yours," he said.

The whole thing? Dean grinned.

…..

Dean had fallen asleep on the couch next to Sammy while they were watching Saturday morning cartoons. Sammy was still too keyed up to sleep, but Dean hadn't been to sleep since the previous night, and while Dad could get away with doing that, Dean wasn't big enough yet.

But he definitely woke up when he heard the boots on the doorstep, the turn of a key in the lock.

He grinned. Dad was back.

He stretched and yawned and tried to look like he hadn't been sleeping or staying up too late or whatever else he had done that he wasn't supposed to be doing while Dad was gone as the door opened.

"Daddy!" Sammy flung himself over the side of the couch and jumped straight into Dad's arms. Dad was still tired; Dean could tell because Sammy nearly knocked him over. But Dad still picked up his little son and swung him around a bit.

"Hey, Sammy," Dad said. He sounded happy, but Dean could hear how tired he really was. Dean was going to make sure Dad slept for at least a few hours before they checked out of the motel. Or, if they didn't have enough money, he was going to make Dad pull over to the side of the road. He'd take Sammy to a playground or something while Dad slept. It was important.

"Daddy, Dean took me on an adventure this morning!"

Dean frowned. He didn't think Dad needed to know about the doctors and their blue box and their time travel. Dad might try to hunt them. And the doctors were nice, if a bit weird. He didn't want them in any danger; Dad could hunt anything down, and they wouldn't be safe with him on their trail.

Dad held Sammy up with one arm as he checked over Dean's handiwork—the salt, the locks, the works. "Yeah? What did you and Dean do?"

"We met some real time travelers, and we went and stood in space so we could look out over the Earth, and then we had ice cream and Dean had pie and this really nice lady let me swim in the swimming pool," Sammy said.

"Is that so?" Dad laughed and jostled Sammy around some more. He turned back to Dean.

Dean straightened up. Maybe Dad wouldn't notice how tired he was. "Hey, Dad," he said. "Welcome back home!"

Dad gave Dean the half-a-smile he always gave him. "Thanks for taking care of your brother for me," he said. "Sounds like you and Sammy had a pretty full day."

Dean could not help grinning. Dad put Sammy back down and headed for bed, and Dean knew Dad wasn't going to pursue anything. He thought Dean and Sammy were playing make-believe.

Well, good. Dean didn't want to have to explain himself.

Dad crawled in the bed, and once Dean was sure he was asleep, Dean took some of the medicine Doctor Jones had given him. (Dad would ask too many questions. Like where he got the money. And how long he left Sammy alone to get it.)

The doctors were long gone, though. Once they dropped Dean and Sammy back off at the motel, Dean had looked out the window to watch the blue box disappear. It made the strange noise and just kind of melted into the air.

They were time travelers. Dean probably wouldn't see them again. Not enough exciting things happened in his life to be worth visiting.


	10. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter One

****A/N: Whelp, here's the next book, and I'm very excited about it :)

****Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to anything related to Doctor Who or Sherlock.

...

**Book Two: Introduction**

He laughed as she leaped out the front door of the TARDIS, all wide eyes and hair tucked in a ponytail and hiking boots. He'd promised her a romp through the Itya Mountains, where the hiking trails were lined with sugary plants better than any candies and the top of the mountain glistened with sugar crystals.

And then she was the one laughing, and when he stepped outside, he could see why.

"This is definitely Earth," he said, frowning. Why'd the TARDIS bring them here? He had been very specific in his instructions.

"Well, let's have a look around, anyway. See if we can't figure out where we are."

"Spot a newspaper. Might help," the Doctor agreed.

Rose just grinned at him and practically skipped away. She was always ready to have an adventure anywhere; it didn't matter to her if he took her somewhere wrong.

The Doctor spotted the remains of a wadded up newspaper in the alleyway. They seemed to have materialized in the poorer part of town, a little side street near the cheapest motels. He unrolled the newspaper and ignored the darker stains.

"We're in 1994," Rose said. She was holding a newspaper, too, but hers was in much better shape. "In Nebraska somewhere. In the winter." She frowned and shivered a bit.

As Rose ran back inside the TARDIS to grab a jacket—or maybe something a little heavier, considering the weather and the fact that it was only midday—the Doctor peeked outside the alleyway to see what was so interesting that would draw the TARDIS there.

It just looked like a normal small town to him.

"Hmm." The Doctor fished around in his pockets for the brown-rimmed glasses, still not sure what he was looking for.

It didn't take long for Rose to come bustling back out the TARDIS door, all bundled up and ready for the American Midwest in the middle of winter. He grinned at her fleecy sweatshirt; he hadn't seen that one yet.

She laced her fingers through his, and he beamed back at her. He liked when she held his hand; it was sort of their thing.

And so they marched out the front of the alleyway together—right into a couple of kids, maybe eight or nine.

"Sorry about that," Rose said immediately, stooping to help them pick up the games they had dropped.

The kids, instead of picking up the rest of their toys, stared at Rose and the Doctor with wide eyes. They dropped whatever else they were holding and ran with everything they had as far away from the two of them as they could.

"Huh," the Doctor said.

"That's weird," Rose said at the same time. They glanced at each other and tried not to smile; it was not polite to smile at someone else's problems, even if it meant there was definitely an adventure to be had here.

Rose hardly hesitated. She had seen kids disappearing before, and worse, last time he'd been taken from her. Still had to check sometimes to make sure he was no longer two-dimensional. It had been a weird feeling.

So Rose wasn't going to let anything happen like that again. Not to children. And she walked right up to the nearest door, banged on it, and grinned her best, winning smile from behind her cap. "Hi there," she said. "We're undercover detectives with the police department. We've been getting some calls from this area—" She paused to nudge the Doctor into showing his slightly psychic paper to the couple standing in front of them. "—and we were wondering if you had any idea why."

It was clear that this couple knew exactly why. Their eyes widened, they stepped back, and the wife mumbled, "Come in."

"We already spoke to the other detectives," the husband said slowly. "About our daughter."

The Doctor could feel both of his hearts drop. He recognized it—the look of desperation on the mother's part and the haunted acceptance of a father who had finally realized his newfound childlessness. Yes, he had seen that look many times, often in the mirror.

He saw Rose as she reached out for the wife's hand. "I'm so sorry," she said.

"Do you have anything?" the wife asked quietly. "Any new leads? Any news at all?"

The doctor frowned. "I'm so sorry," he said, looking at the father rather than the mother because his hope was already gone, and the Doctor did not want to see it dim in the light. "We're not part of that division."

The wife sniffed, but the husband simply blinked like he had expected this news. "You're just here about the disturbances?"

Rose nodded.

The husband sighed and settled into his chair. "It's the same case, you know," he sighed. "I know the department can't see it now, but whatever . . . er, whoever is taking our children is also causing your disturbances."

"Jack," the wife said, and her tone told the Doctor that she did not believe a "what" was doing this.

Jack frowned like he had said too much. But he pressed on, turning to the Doctor who had not yet called him crazy. "Whatever it is out there never left, sir. It's still out there."

His eyes were so sincere, so bright—the Doctor knew he was serious. "And you think it's taking your kids?"

At this, the wife burst into tears. "I've lost her, and she'll always think I hated her!"

Jack patted his wife on the back. "That's not true, Lilly."

"I yelled at her," Lilly sobbed. "She got in a fight at school, and I yelled at her!"

As Jack moved to comfort his wife, the Doctor sensed that it would be a good time to leave. "We're sorry to have disturbed you," he said. "Thank you for your help."

As the Doctor moved for the door, Lilly stopped him with a sniff and a whispered, "Can I ask you something?"

Rose hung back, and the Doctor released the doorknob. "Sure."

"Your accents—you're not from around here. So how did you find yourselves in our town?"

The Doctor opened his mouth to reply, but Rose beat him to the punch. "Oh, we never know how or why we get places. We just try to go where we're needed."

Jack and Lilly both smiled at Rose's cheery optimism and waved them out of the house.

They were only about halfway down the sidewalk when they heard someone shout, "Hey, Doc!"

The Doctor turned. He saw a teenager, maybe fourteen or fifteen, running right at him from about a block away. The kid had gelled, blonde hair, plenty of freckles, and a leather jacket that was several sizes too big. He didn't recognize him.

The teenager caught up to them and grinned. "Do you just look for trouble little small town when you run around time, or did you just miss me?" He grinned so widely that his eyes crinkled, and—if it was possible—the grin got even wider when he saw Rose. His entire posture shifted, and he smirked. "Hello, hello. Who's your new lady friend? What happened to the other doctor?"

Rose, who had been beaming at this kid until then, glanced at the Doctor with wide eyes.

The Doctor frowned at the implication that Rose had not been with him at some point, then turned to the kid. "I'm sorry. Time traveler. Things don't always happen to me in the right order. Who are you?"

The kid frowned to match Rose's frown. He looked at Rose, then the Doctor, then shrugged. "Oh, okay. I get it. I didn't mess with the rules of time by running into you or nothing, right?" The kid shrugged again. "I'll just leave now."

Rose surprised them both when she reached out and grabbed the kid's arm. "Don't be silly, Dean. We could use your help around here. I'll bet you know what's going on around here, huh?"

Dean looked just as surprised as the Doctor did when Rose knew his name, and he jerked his arm away with wide, blinking eyes. He stared at Rose for a while before, finally, he chuckled. "Okay, I'll bite. You a time traveler too?"

Rose nodded. "Sorry. I wasn't going to say anything because you were eighteen when we met."

"When you met me, you mean," Dean said. He groaned. "Time travel man, I don't know."

The Doctor stared at Rose. "You know this kid?"

Rose blushed the kind of blush that made the Doctor just a little bit jealous. "remember when me and Jack disappeared that time we visited Maine?"

Of course he remembered. He'd spent two days tearing apart a small forest trying to find them. And then they'd shown up at the TARDIS, dirty and hungry but still safe. They said they'd nearly been sacrificed by some pagans, but a hunter had helped them out. At the time, he hadn't thought much of it. Weirder things had happened to them.

The Doctor grinned. "Well, anyone who brings Rose back to me can't be all bad. Nice to meet you, Dean. I'm the Doctor."

"I know," Dean said with a grin. "Doctor Smith, time traveler extraordinaire. We've met."

"Well, I look forward to that," the Doctor said. "But just call me the Doctor."

"You don't think that's . . . pretentious?" Dean asked, wrinkling his nose. "How 'bout a first name, since you got mine?"

"No, that's my name. I'm the Doctor."

"The Doctor?"

"Yep."

"That's it?"

"That's me."

Dean narrowed his eyes, then laughed. "Like I can judge. I've used plenty of fake names with my dad before." He shrugged again and shot a sideways grin at Rose. "So, Doc, I assume you're here to help with the missing kids?"

"We'll do what we can to help," the Doctor agreed, "but don't call me Doc, okay?"

Dean just grinned at them both. He was going to be fun; the Doctor could tell.


	11. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Two

A/N: Wow! Thank you all so much for the continued support in this story! I can't believe you all put up with me. :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

Dean had recognized the sound as soon as he turned the corner. The TARDIS. He had almost forgotten about the ridiculous time travelers and their little blue box. He almost believed that he really had made the whole thing up like he told Dad. But you never forget your first hunt, no matter how weird the partners are.

The Doctor looked a little different now, though. He looked . . . younger, if that was possible. Maybe it was just the girl beside him. She'd make anyone feel younger.

Dean decided to throw caution to the wind for once. After all, he already knew the Doctor, and he had just been thinking that this case would be much easier with a little backup.

He was pretty sure he was dealing with a rawhead. Sammy's descriptions made that pretty clear. And since Dad wasn't anywhere to be found, Dean figured he'd better hunt the thing down before it made a meal of some other poor kids. Or, more importantly, Sammy.

Dad didn't know about his hunting. Dad wasn't supposed to know. He said he'd take Dean out on some real hunts when he got older, but so far, he'd only been dealing with small-time stuff. Basic hauntings, the occasional ghoul. Dad was gonna work him up to bigger things once he could handle it.

Bull. Dad only made Dean stay home because Sammy wasn't old enough yet. Dean could handle anything now, and Dad knew it.

But the point was Dad was gone, and Sammy was talking about the kids in school disappearing, just dropping out all of a sudden. And the worried parents would come to the school, and everybody was whispering about it.

Dean knew it was a rawhead. The pattern fit. The kids that disappeared were all in fights or in detention. And the timing of the disappearances fit, too.

He didn't know much about rawheads except that they went after naughty children and drowned them. He'd gone to the library after school to do some research, but it was scarce. The thing was a story of nightmares, but no one bothered to write anything down. Just retold the story to kids to keep them from misbehaving.

The lore was divided. The thing either lived near lakes or in dark cupboards, especially under the stairs (more recent lore said pipes under the sink), where they'd sit on a pile of bones and let the blood run down their faces.

There were pictures. It wasn't pretty.

It would be hard enough to find the thing. Lore said it could disguise itself as a rock just by crouching. Plus he was getting to be a teenager. The things might not come after him even if he was breaking the rules and sneaking around after school.

But he was gonna kill this thing. For Sammy.

Sammy was terrified of walking home from school, and even though Dean was a freshman at the high school, he ditched his last class to go get Sam before classes were over so he could walk the kid home. (He was always real careful not to go anywhere near ponds when he ditched school, and he kept his knife open when he walked past any rocks that looked even remotely big enough to be Bloody Bones the Rawhead.) But Sammy was scared, so Dean was gonna kill this thing. No time to wait for Dad to get home and handle it, even if Dad was the only one old enough to get a taser to kill the thing.

Dean relayed all this to the Doctor, who sat there with his chin in his hand and an expression of deep thought. When Dean finally finished, the Doctor just parted his lips and whispered:

"Rawhead and Bloody Bones

Steals naughty children from their homes

Takes them to his dirty den

And they are never seen again."

"What's that?" Rose asked, wrinkling her nose.

"It's on old rhyme. Very British," the Doctor said. He laughed. "The rawhead's been around since before people were around. Mostly, it stuck to the British Isles, but I guess it's been colonizing right alongside the humans."

"Hey, I read that rhyme in one of Dad's lore books," Dean said, grinning. "So you've seen something like this before?"

The Doctor shook his head. "Only in stories."

"Well, now's your chance to see 'em up close. One of 'em made it here to Tennessee, and it's scaring my little brother." Dean snorted. Like Sammy should be afraid. He was a perfect kid, never did anything wrong. Good grades, obedience, all that. If anyone was gonna get taken, it'd be Dean, not Sammy.

"And you think you can take it on all by yourself?" the Doctor asked.

Dean sniffed. "If you remembered meeting me when I was eight, you'd also remember I totally saved your butt back then. Think I'm any weaker now I've grown a couple feet?"

The Doctor just smiled at him, refusing to rise to the bait. "Alright, then," he said with a broad sweep of his arm. "If you know what's taking the children, by all means, lead on."

Dean paused, raised his eyebrow. "You mean you believe me?"

The Doctor laughed. "Why wouldn't I? Rawheads have been around since the time of the Silurians. 'Course, then they were called something else, but . . . ." He stopped when he saw Rose raise her eyebrows at him. "What?"

"You're doing that thing again," Rose said.

"What thing?"

"That thing where you just talk and assume everyone knows what you're talking about."

"I like her," Dean said. He'd noticed that when he was hanging out with the Doctor before, when he was explaining all the bits and pieces of the TARDIS and going on and on about futuristic crap that Dean had absolutely no shot at understanding. He was just glad the Doctor had someone around to call him out on it now.

He wondered what had happened to Rose to make the Doctor stop traveling with her.

"So," Rose said suddenly. She clapped her hands and rubbed them together with a smile. "Are you gonna fill us in on what's been going on or not?"

Dean tilted his head at Rose. She seemed very confident that he could help, but then, he hadn't yet grown into the hunter she would know in a few years. He could only hope he'd live up to her expectations despite the age gap.

But she was right; he had the know-how to get them started on the case. But he had some reservations. "A couple things first," he said. He pointed at the Doctor and grimaced. "You don't get to fight me."

The Doctor laced a hand over his heart. "Why would I do that?" He seemed genuinely offended, and Dean would have believed him if he hadn't seen the look in the Doctor's eyes. Dean knew that look—the look of someone who knew exactly what the Winchesters did for a living and disapproved of it with every self-righteous moral fiber they had.

Dean frowned. "I mean it. This thing's killing children, and we're not gonna try to reason with it or whatever other pansy thing you want to do."

The Doctor frowned but didn't say anything. Dean wasn't sure if that was a good thing or not.

Rose cleared her throat. "So, Dean."

He turned to give her a sideways smile, but she was too much older than he was and didn't fall for it like girls usually do.

She laughed. "Are you going to tell me what a rawhead is?" she asked. "All I've got to go on is a rhyme." She glared at the Doctor, and he smiled sheepishly.

Yeah, these two were so very definitely a couple.

Dean still had has backpack. It was old and tattered, and he was probably going to buy himself a new one, but he'd become acquainted with every pocket lining, every hidden zipper, and besides, Dean didn't much like change. If something was good when he bought it first, why change it? His music was still good, Dad's jacket was still good and kept out the cold, his backpack still carried stuff. But he was glad to have something physical to remind him of his first hunt with the Doctor—especially since the Doctor himself didn't remember it.

He handed Rose one of the books he had checked out from the library, and she turned to the dog-earned pages. While Rose read, Dean turned to the Doctor. "Most of the kids disappeared from this neighborhood. Makes sense—it's still being finished, and there's a whole bunch of empty houses that thing can hide in.

The Doctor nodded. "Makes sense."

"Sammy gave me the names of a few classmates that went missing," Dean continued. "So I broke into the school records."

The Doctor frowned but didn't say anything; he was probably trying to stick to Dean's request that the Doctor not fight with him.

Dean should probably have accepted the unspoken peace offering, but he just had to push his luck. "It was an easy job. They didn't even have those fancy new alarm systems, and I came prepared for that. The wiring's not so bad to get through."

"Shouldn't you be in school?" the Doctor asked.

Dean grinned. Yes. Good opening. "What's school gonna teach me that I actually use in my life? Half the things me and my dad hunt down don't exist according to my teachers."

The Doctor could tell he'd hit a nerve, so he backed down. Huh. He used to be easier to bait. This Rose girl must have done him a whole world of good to hold back the storm Doctor Jones described when she was the one traveling with him.

But Rose picked up the thought. "Oh, I don't know, Dean. You're pretty smart. At least stick around and take some shop classes, huh?" Her eyes twinkled, and Dean couldn't help wondering what Rose knew about his future.

Dean was going to argue it out some more (this was the closest anyone had ever come to caring about how he spent his future, and Dean knew from experience with Sammy that a good argument was the best and only way to test out their opinions on his life) but then he was reminded why he was there in the first place: he heard a high-pitched, terror-filled shriek.

Dean, the Doctor, and Rose didn't even have to say anything to each other. They all just took off running right for the sound. There were kids in trouble.


	12. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Three

A/N: This Dean is a little tougher to pin down because he's somewhere in between the Dean we know and the Weechester we love. He hasn't ever hunted with Sammy. He hasn't lost anyone yet. He hasn't been disillusioned of his father-worship. So I wanted to make his reactions a little more vulnerable but a little more visceral at the same time. I hope I struck the right note.

On another side note, I'm engaged, so if I ever miss a week, that's why. I'll try not to miss a week, because I love this story and I usually work on it during class anyway, but I WILL be missing a week in May after I get married. Because of reasons.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

It was hard to tell where the screams were coming from. Dean was right; this place was the perfect place for a rawhead to hide out. Forests on all sides of the unfinished houses, plenty of rocks and fallen trees for camouflage, and houses for cupboards. (The few rawheads he knew about from Silurian bedtime stories had always been drawn to claustrophobic spaces, so the cupboard thing was sort of a natural progression.) Everything echoed, and it was even worse with all the parents scrambling out of their houses and joining the chorus of shouts, trying to determine whose screams were whose.

Dean was fast, though. It was obvious he'd scoped out the area beforehand—he seemed to know all the best shortcuts through lawns and broken fences. He scaled hedges and avoided windows easily; this kid was definitely a pro.

And then Dean was gone, disappeared into the shadows.

"When you said you were helped by a hunter, I didn't think you meant that kind of hunter," the Doctor muttered to Rose as they tried to find their guide again.

"How do you mean? Jack said he was a hunter," Rose said.

"Not that kind of hunter," the Doctor said again. "Dean doesn't hunt animals. He hunts . . . well, you would call them monsters. But things like this, like rawheads, well, they were just here before you humans got here."

"So he would hunt aliens, do you think?" Rose asked quietly.

"Anything that's not human," the Doctor agreed.

Rose's eyes darkened, and her lips pressed together into a thin line. Even though the Doctor hated to cast a shadow on the kid who was helping them out, he could hardly ignore the fact that he felt a little less jealous now. She'd been so dreamy over him before. (And so had Jack, but that was a different matter entirely.) Good to knock him down a peg.

The Doctor stopped and grinned to himself. Well, look at that. He was being petty. He hadn't done that in a long time.

The screaming had faded by this time; they still hadn't been able to trace it back to its source, not with the echoing trees and the too-many abandoned houses. The parents who had rushed out to investigate the noise were slowly going back inside. It was written all over their faces: the relief that their children were not the ones screaming and the exhausted terror of people living under siege.

But one set of parents did not go back inside.

Rose didn't even say anything. She just went right for the mother and grabbed her hand. "Don't you worry. We're got some of the best people on this case. We'll figure out what's happening here." She always knew what to say. That's why he chose her.

The mother turned suddenly and grasped both of Rose's hands in her own. "They're gone," she said blankly.

"We'll find them," Rose assured her.

"They're gone," she said again, and the Doctor thought she was going into shock until she said something else: "What am I going to tell that poor boy's parents?"

The Doctor frowned. They had only heard one child screaming. If there were more . . . . "What happened?"

But the mother still had a tight grip on Rose's hand, so the father stepped in, looking a little less worn but still just as near the edge of an emotional breakdown—but that was understandable, considering the circumstances. "Our daughter, Alex, brought a young man home to get some homework done. We told them both to stay inside; we know there have been problems in the neighborhood. We thought they were both inside working on their desert panorama."

_Thud_.

All four of them turned just in time to see Dean fall off his perch on the rickety fence. He looked pale and shaken—and not just from running. His mouth moved wordlessly for a few minutes before, finally, he managed to eke out a quiet, "What was his name?"

"Sorry?" The father just blinked at the freckled teenager who had just dropped onto his lawn out of nowhere. (None of them had noticed him get there—he was good.)

But Dean wasn't taking the time to revel in his espionage successes. He gritted his teeth, and the Doctor saw that Dean's hands were shaking as he balled them into tight fists. "You said your daughter had a boy over to work on a project. What was his name?" Every word was measured, every breath labored, and the Doctor could recognize the barely concealed panic behind his eyes.

The mother paused, bit her lip. "We just met him today. What was his name?"

Dean was visibly holding his breath.

"It started with an S, didn't it, dear?" the father said. "Seth . . . or Steve . . .was it?"

"Sam," the mother said at last. "Yes, that was it."

Dean let out the breath in an explosion of pure terror and sound. "Sammy!" he shouted. His voice was higher, more strained than usual. He took off running as fast as he could, still shouting, "Sammy!"

The mother gasped and put a hand to her mouth. She sank to the ground and began to sob openly. Rose stayed beside her, her hands still entwined, and she looked up with pleading eyes. The message was clear: Go after Dean.

He raised an eyebrow: Would she be okay if he left without her?

She nodded and jerked her head in the direction Dean had run: Go after him.

He took off running, but even with his much longer legs and larger stride, it was hard to catch a little boy driven by sheer terror. "Dean!" he shouted after the little hunter, but the only response was more frantic shouting echoing in the trees: "Sammy!"

The Doctor said nothing as he ran after Dean. He'd seen that look before, knew it too well. The look of someone who'd just lost everything, who was terrified that his entire world was gone.

He finally caught up to Dean when the poor kid ran out of breath. Dean was hunched over, gulping in air and wiping his eyes, checking over his shoulder to make sure no one could tell he was crying.

"Who's Sammy?" the Doctor asked.

Dean jumped in surprise, and the Doctor hid a secret smile. He could be sneaky when he wanted to, but he didn't want to very often. Dean's entire body straightened up when he realized the Doctor was there, and he stopped sniffling. "Sammy's my . . . he's my brother." Dean looked down at the ground, bit his lip. He was not holding together very well. The Doctor knew he could fall apart any minute.

The Doctor didn't say anything. It wasn't time for talking; that would come later. He just reached out and pulled Dean into a hug.

At first, Dean stiffened at the hug, like he didn't know how to react to it. And then, slowly, he gave in. He reached around the Doctor's middle, carefully at first, and then without reservation as his shoulders shook with unrepressed sobs.

"I should have told him to stay home," Dean said. "He usually stays home and studies. But he's such a good student, and he always gets all A's, and I figured he would know better than to go anywhere dangerous for a stupid school assignment."

He pounded his fist weakly against the Doctor's chest, but the Doctor just held tighter. He had a feeling this kid didn't get the opportunity to let this out very often, and he knew from experience that a stranger's shoulder was sometimes the best outlet.

"He should have stayed inside," Dean said again, softer this time. He was finally winding down when something awful occurred to him. He stood up straighter, gasped in his breath. "We only heard a girl screaming," he said.

"Yes," the Doctor said carefully.

"So what happened to Sammy that he couldn't call me for help? He knew I was close." And then the tears started all over again. The Doctor thought he could discern a few more words in all that, words like "I'm supposed to take care of him."

Rose caught up to them later. The Doctor didn't know how much later it was. But Dean had cried himself dry by the time Rose got there, and he wasn't much of a crier, so it couldn't have been very long. The redness was gone from Dean's eyes by the time she skidded to a stop under the shade of the nearest oak tree, but she could still tell he wasn't okay. She could always tell.

"You lost your brother?" she asked. (Neither the Doctor nor Dean bothered to ask how Rose knew about Sammy; there was a lot she knew that the Doctor hadn't heard about and that Dean wasn't allowed to know just yet.)

Dean nodded numbly.

Rose smiled. "Well, don't worry. We'll find him."

But Dean was done with the shock and the despair part of his loss. He charged right ahead into action. "Of course we will," he snapped. "He's my responsibility, and I'm not about to let anything happen to him."

"We don't have much time," the Doctor observed, not to contradict Dean but to remind him of reality and prepare him in case things didn't go quite the way he planned.

Dean turned to the Doctor. He didn't have the same fire other people had when he suggested the worst. He just kind of looked at the Doctor blankly, as if he'd been speaking Gallifreyan. He blinked twice, and then, "We'll just have to hurry then if we're going to save Alex as well as Sammy."

And that was that. There was no arguing with the kid. It was simple. They were going to save Sammy, and nothing was going to stop them. They weren't going to fail. It wasn't an option.

It was obvious the kid meant the world to Dean. He had been the picture of stoicism before, had even flirted with Rose and kidded around with the Doctor. But as soon as Sammy was in danger, everything fell apart. The façade was gone. He was terrified.

The Doctor made a mental note for all future meetings with Dean: Sammy always came first.


	13. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Four

A/N: I've been travelling all weekend, and through several hours sitting in airports, I have gotten a lot of stuff written both with this and with Real Life books. So here! Have a chapter, and you'll ALSO get your regular Tuesday one, just cuz I love y'all haha.

Disclaimer: I still don't own anything related to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

Dean had never—_never_—lost Sammy before. He was too careful.

Dad was gonna kill him.

But he was done crying. He'd panicked, and he lost a lot of time he could have been, should have been, spending on finding Sammy. He hadn't known what to do, and he'd broken down—which was never a good idea in his line of work. From now on, no more crying, no more tears—not ever. There was no point to it. And Sammy was bound to get himself in more trouble once he started hunting with them. Dean couldn't fall apart every time; that was dangerous.

But it was friggin' terrifying. That's what it was. He was gonna tear Sammy a new one when this was all over.

His backpack was heavy. He'd stripped down a cassette player to its basic components—a battery and some stripped wire and a basic electrical charge. Probably not enough to kill the thing, but he'd done his best in the circumstances.

Maybe Rose was right—he should really take some shop classes to refine his hobby. It might help him in more ways than just helping Dad fix up the Impala.

His head was clearer now. He really shouldn't have let himself be selfish like that, shouldn't have focused on how scared _he _was when Sammy was definitely more terrified. He had been so selfish to cry, to panic. Focusing on himself like that only clouded his judgment and made it harder to work. But now he was alert and thinking. And he had a plan. "We gotta have some bait," he announced.

Both the Doctor and Rose seemed surprised that he was on his feet at all—much less calling the shots again. (Well, the Doctor looked surprised. Rose only looked surprised for a second before she looked sad.) She tentatively stepped forward. "What are you thinking, Dean?"

"I'm thinking this thing is gonna have a hard time killing Sammy and his stupid girlfriend if he's distracted by another naughty kid."

The Doctor frowned, shook his head, and tried to take Dean by the arm before Dean pulled away. "No, we're not doing that."

"Yeah, I know. I may be too old to count as a kid he could kidnap."

Why was the Doctor smiling like that?

Rose bit her lip. "It's not that we don't believe in your plan, we just . . . . ."

"We think you've gone bonkers," the Doctor supplied enthusiastically. "What help are you going to be to your brother if you get yourself killed?"

Dean laughed. "You act like I won't have backup." He pulled off his backpack and rummaged through it until he found his marvelous invention. He shoved it at Rose—since he was pretty sure the Doctor wouldn't touch anything that looked even remotely like a weapon. "This thing won't kill it, but it should slow it down long enough for you two to get to me and the other kids." Dean tried to pretend that his hands weren't shaking.

"We can just keep searching," the Doctor suggested.

Dean shook his head. "No. No way. That'll take too long." He took a deep breath and exhaled loudly. "Look, just try to keep up this time, okay?"

And then he was off. He knew the Doctor could bluster and argue for ages, and Sammy just didn't have that time. But he also knew these two time travelers couldn't keep up with him if he didn't want them to, and he disappeared into a nearby basement window.

He'd been watching this neighborhood, and he knew all its secrets. He knew about the cache of wine in this house and knew the alarm system was busted—the repair men were supposed to come tomorrow.

He climbed out of the window with a bottle in each hand and one tucked in the crook of his arm. He caught up with the Doctor and Rose—or let them catch up to him, whatever—and saluted them with a gulp of fine wine. "What do you think? This get his attention or should I steal some jewelry?"

Rose was trying very hard not to smile or laugh, and the Doctor had apparently given up on arguing and just shook his head with his lips tightly pressed together. "I still think your whole plan is balmy."

"Yeah, well, you basically think that about hunters in general, so I'm not that surprised," Dean muttered. He'd been close enough to hear the Doctor telling Rose about what he did for a living—what _Dad_ did—and he knew the Doctor thought he was . . . what was the right word for it? . . . morally superior to all hunters, including, apparently, Dean.

He hadn't realized how much he liked and respected the Doctor, how much the crazy Brit meant to him, until he realized how much it hurt, how brutally disappointed he was to hear the Doctor was disappointed in his career choice. It was a dangerous thing—wanting to impress a time-traveler.

Well, screw him.

He straightened up a little. "You two better make yourselves scarce. I doubt he'll come after me if I've got an audience."

"I don't think—"

"_Scram!_" Dean bellowed. He was done playing nice. "Sammy's in trouble, and you're wasting time."

The Doctor's frown deepened, but, Dean knew, he had him. He remembered how the Doctor played with Sammy, remembered how the guy was with kids. He was a father—that much was clear—and if kids were in danger, he'd do pretty much anything.

So Dean found himself sitting on a broken old fence post polishing off his second bottle of wine. He hiccoughed and laughed. He'd been drinking Dad's beer for a year now, but this was more than he'd ever had.

He felt warm all over and kind of fuzzy, like someone had wrapped him in a blanket. He was invincible. He could take on anything.

What was that song? "Bloody bones, bloody bones . . . ." He couldn't remember the rest of it. He hiccoughed again and giggled. He liked this stuff.

He frowned. No. He was supposed to be serious. He had to keep his head so he could save Sammy.

He hiccoughed again and dissolved into giggles. Crap. He was gonna have to learn how to not get drunk and how to hold his liquor if he wanted to be a hunter. The after-hunt beer was practically a rule, so he'd better be able to handle it.

Maybe he should get a drink of water to clear his head.

He hopped down from the fence post and tried to wobble his way to the door. Crap. He'd never been drunk before. Then again, he'd never had this much to drink before. He'd only pinched Dad's stuff when he could—and when Uncle Bobby was around, he could have a whole can. But this was different.

He was starting to see the flaw in his plan: he needed a clear head.

The abandoned house might have running water. He wasn't sure how far the contractors got building the place.

His legs were wobbly.

Ouch. Yes. That was a door. He had to turn the handle before he could walk through it. Right. Of course.

He could just see the Doctor now, could just picture the white knuckles and gritted teeth and the whispers about what a ridiculously awful idea this still was. He'd be muttering to Rose about hunters taking risks or something.

Dean gritted his teeth and balled up his fists. He'd show them both that he was plenty capable. He pulled the handle, kicked in the door, and immediately hiccoughed, which totally ruined the effect.

It was probably a bad idea to leave the open woods where his backup could keep an eye out for him, but Dean was gonna dunk his head in cold water. His plan wasn't working, the rawhead hadn't come, and Dean needed a clear head to come up with a plan B.

The floor creaked.

Dean froze. The warm haze seemed to zap into nothing. He was alert. He was ready. He could take on anything because he was invincible. He could . . . .

A rat scurried across the floor.

Dean actually laughed out loud as he searched the house for a bathroom or an unfinished kitchen. He couldn't believe he'd gotten so worked up. He was supposed to be better trained than that. He was slipping.

The adrenaline rush had helped clear his head a little bit. Rawheads lived under sinks and in cupboards, so it probably wasn't a good idea to drunk his head in the kitchen sink. What had he been thinking?

He heard another creak, but this one was the front door.

He smiled to himself. "I thought you were gonna stay out of sight. Some undercover agents you are." He laughed a little too loud because his voice sounded so small and alone as it echoed through the unfinished halls of the house.

The Doctor didn't answer, but that was fine. He was supposed to be sneaky anyway. It was frankly amazing that he could get anything done—he was tall and big and lanky and goofy and loud.

"You don't have to worry," Dean said. "I was just gonna splash some water on my face because I think I'm drunk."

Still no answer. Dean frowned. He could have sworn that would get some kind of rise out of the Doctor. Maybe something was wrong.

He pulled out the .22 that Dad gave him when Uncle Bobby made them sit down for cake and ice cream on Dean's last birthday. It had been weird when they all made such a fuss out of him. He gave most of his ice cream to Sammy anyway because his little brother had strep throat. But it was a good present, shot straight, and fit easily in his backpack. He pulled it out and tried to ignore how his hands were shaky from the wine.

"Doctor?"

His head hurt before he realized he'd been knocked to the floor.


	14. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Five

A/N: Like I said, I spent a whole lot of time at the airport getting stuff written. This is the result. Enjoy!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights or anything related to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

"I think he's drunk," Rose whispered.

The Doctor nodded. Dean had a stronger liver than most kids his age, but two full bottles of very old wine would get to even an older man. (The Doctor wasn't sure whether he should be proud or worried about the fact that Dean made it through a bottle and a half before he started to show it.)

Both the Doctor and Rose watched as the scowl, the fear, and the pain slowly faded from Dean's face, replaced by a fit of giggles.

Dean had a good smile. He should show it off more. Just not right now.

"Should we do something?" Rose whispered.

The Doctor bit his lip. As much as he hated to admit it, Dean's plan was really the only good one they had, and it would be a shame to abandon it. Not to mention the Doctor really had no idea what Dean would do if they started to act insubordinate. He was a giggly drunk, but he could turn nasty. Most hunters were like that.

"We'll wait," the Doctor said at last. "Dean can take care of himself." He didn't let Rose see that he had crossed his fingers behind his back. It probably wouldn't do anything, but they would need all the luck they could get.

Dean toddled back into one of the unfinished houses nearby. The Doctor and Rose weren't exactly sure what he planned to do, but every move had been measured until this point, so the Doctor figured they should just wait.

Then again, they were dealing with a drunk teenager . . . .

"Maybe we should follow him," Rose muttered.

"My thoughts exactly."

Rose picked up the ingenious little machine Dean had built and gathered it up in the best defensive pose she could muster. The Doctor couldn't help being impressed at that part, at least. They hadn't really hit the digital age of this planet yet, and already Dean was far ahead of his time. If the Doctor wasn't convinced Dean would try to kill everything in sight—and if he wasn't already content with Rose, which he definitely was—Dean would have been perfect to travel with him.

Maybe he'd invite him when he was older. Or younger. Less . . . hunter-y, at least.

But it was a decent device for the materials he had to work with and the limited technological knowledge of his time. Rawheads had a hard time with electricity—enough of it could kill them—and this was the perfect weapon to fight them with. The Doctor didn't usually appreciate such raw talent going toward destruction, but, well, Dean was a hunter. And this was quality work. Kid was wasted on fighting monsters.

"What's he doing in there?" Rose whispered. "He knows he's supposed to stay where we can see him. How are we supposed to provide him with any backup if we can't find him?"

"I'm sure he has a plan," the Doctor said, but it was obvious he was trying to convince himself just as much as he wanted to convince Rose. More than likely, he was just flat-out drunk and had decided to do something stupid and dangerous.

"Of course he does," Rose muttered. She could always see right through him when he tried to lie to her.

They made it to the house just in time to hear Dean's shouted explanation: "You don't have to worry," Dean said. "I was just gonna splash some water on my face because I think I'm drunk."

"Oh, he _thinks _he's drunk," Rose giggled to the Doctor in a low whisper. She rolled her eyes and smiled playfully at him, but he held a finger to his lips.

The Doctor was just about to shout his answer back to Dean, but he saw something moving out of the corner of his eye. "Rose," he whispered tersely. He jerked his head in the direction of the movement.

Rose saw it too. Her face was pale, and she looked worried—she must have seen more of the creature than he had—but her lips were pressed together and he knew she wasn't going to let anything happen to Dean.

"Do you think it lives in this house, then?" Rose asked.

"Not sure. We'll have to wait just a bit longer," the Doctor said. He couldn't hear any muffled sounds, and he had been listening with every sense he had.

_Thump_.

Rose rushed forward without thinking. They both knew that sound. It was the sound of a body hitting the floor, and they'd both heard that sound far too often in their experience.

"Dean?" Rose called out. When there was no answer, her voice jumped up a pitch. "Dean!"

"Dean!" the Doctor shouted. Still nothing. He frowned and nodded to Rose, who of course understood. They split up without a word, still calling out into the dark confines of the house. "Dean! Dean, where are you? Are you okay?"

The Doctor frowned. This was definitely not what they wanted. They had hoped to _see _the rawhead when it took Dean, and now they had three missing kids and less than an hour to save them. He hadn't known any kids to survive longer than that.

He kicked the nearest kickable object out of sheer frustration, but it happened to be a box of tools, and that really did nothing to improve his mood.

There were still plenty of places to look, of course. Lots of nooks and crannies in unfinished walls, but the Doctor's gut was telling him that Dean was long gone from here. They'd have at least heard something by now.

He _knew _this was a bad plan.

When Rose finally caught up to him, she looked terrified. "Doctor," she breathed, "he can't die now, can he? Not when I meet him in a couple years?"

The Doctor frowned. "Time can be rewritten," he said, mostly because he didn't really know the answer. It didn't seem likely that Dean could die, not when the entire reason they were working together was that Rose recognized him and convinced them it would be fine to collaborate, not when Rose and Jack were still alive because of him. There was a lot tied up in him still being around.

But there wasn't as much riding on the other kids' survival, and in some ways, that was worse. If they could rewrite time, if Sammy didn't survive when he was supposed to—or maybe if they saved him instead of letting him die—what could happen? Dean certainly would never be the same without his Sammy, that much was certain. But what kind of Dean would he have to be to save Rose and Jack?

He could usually tell when to interfere, but Dean and his brother . . . there was something different about them. Time was not quite so rigid in their lifetimes. It almost felt like something had already messed with their pasts, somehow.

That was usually how he could tell who he could take with him. Ordinary people whose timelines weren't fixed forever, who didn't have a set destiny. People who could forge their own paths and maybe change the world while they were at it.

If only he wasn't a hunter, he'd be much less dangerous to take in the TARDIS. But the Doctor didn't want Dean killing off the first aliens he met—which he would.

"Well, I think he's going to make it," Rose said, bringing the Doctor out of his thoughts. "You know what else? I think we're going to save him and his brother and the neighborhood girl."

The Doctor couldn't help smiling. He really couldn't. She just looked so sure of herself, so absolutely convinced. But maybe that was the Bad Wolf inside her. She still came out a couple times, just declaring things.

"Of course we are," the Doctor said. He straightened the lapels of his jacket and set to work on the electrodevice Dean had created.

It was a good weapon, to be sure, and that was definitely what Dean intended. But he didn't realize his own potential.

Sonic screwdriver in hand and tongue tucked between his teeth, the Doctor set to work on the device, twisting and turning and changing. Yes. Yes, this was a very good design. Pliable, easy to manipulate. It wouldn't take much. Kid was wasted on hunting.

"What are you up to?" Rose asked. She smiled with her tongue between her teeth, the laughing, playful smile of a girl who knew exactly what her Doctor was up to but wanted the particulars explained so he could show off.

"Creatures like rawheads that are specifically susceptible to electromagnetic waves and electricity have that weakness because they hold their own charge. Dean doesn't know why this device works, but if he did, he'd be proud to realize he's made the perfect tracking device."

"What, so we'll just follow the electrical trail all the way back to the rawhead's lair?"

"Exactly," the Doctor said with a smile. He loved it when she could follow his techno-babble. She was getting better and better at it every day.

It didn't take him very long to reconfigure the device. Dean had already done such a good job designing it—it was logical, flowed well, gave the electricity a place to go. But it wasn't very powerful, and the Doctor knew it was a long shot. He wasn't even sure if the rawhead was in range of his tracker, and he really didn't fancy having to run around the neighborhood waiting for this thing to pick up the slightest trace of their prey.

The device hummed to life, and Rose grinned almost as broadly as he did. "It's working," she breathed.

The Doctor frowned at her, not sure if he was annoyed with how much she seemed to care about Dean—which, well, he really shouldn't have been all that annoyed, since she was always concerned about the safety of everyone they had ever met, but this kind of concern seemed . . . different (he was trying to avoid thoughts of Adam and Mickey)—or if he was just offended that she sounded like she hadn't believed it would work.

But he didn't have time to think about it very long, because the machine whirred and beeped at him, chirping away almost happily.

The Doctor grinned. "Brilliant."


	15. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Six

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural and Doctor Who or any related rights.

...

Dean came up gasping.

He hadn't realized breathing was so wonderful. The air tasted great. He sucked it in through his teeth in huge gaps, trying not to let the coughing spasm overtake him; he was too busy trying to get oxygen back into his system.

He wasn't sure what he'd done in all his thrashing, but something had forced the rawhead to let go. He'd been lucky, and he was going to take advantage of the air.

His vision was still blurry, but at least he'd managed to fight back the black that had been threatening the corners of his vision until then. He was _not_ going to pass out.

And then there was a hand on the back of his head, and he went under again.

He'd known this was a possibility, of course. The rawhead drowned its victims, and Dean had been prepared to accept this risk. He hadn't told the Doctor that, but then, he knew the Doctor wouldn't have agreed to his plan if he thought there was that much risk.

The thing was, if nothing else, Dean knew he'd be able to delay the rawhead. He was the bigger risk. He was bigger, he was belligerent, and he was harder to kill and therefore more likely to get away. The thing was going to have to deal with him first before it turned its attention to Sammy or what's-her-name cowering in the corner. So Dean was slowing the thing down, maybe giving Sammy a chance to get out of there.

Dean had been satisfied, at least, to see that his brother put up a fight. The kid was only semi-conscious when Dean woke up to the terror of leathery fingers in his hair, but Sammy definitely woke up when his brother was being dragged around. Kid was dizzy and tied up, but he was at least thinking. And Dean had done what he could to make sure Sammy could defend himself.

Now to see if Sammy had learned his lessons well.

And then there was water again, cold, oppressing water in a kitchen sink that had been overfilled and still had the tap going. That was the worst of it, the tap running water down his neck and back when his face was still under there. Like Dean wanted to die with soaked underwear.

Maybe if he kept making light of the situation he wouldn't think about how much his head hurt and how the water was now just a little bit pink.

His lungs were crying out. He hated this feeling—not being able to breathe. It was the worst feeling. How could he get out of it?

His foot connected with something leathery, and the pressure let up on the back of his head just long enough to let him gasp in more precious air before he was back under again, and this time with a good kick in the side that let out all the breath he had managed to take in during those precious few seconds.

He was dying.

He had known it might come to this, of course. But he had kinda figured he'd die with his dad, fighting some evil something and facing down a huge army of vampires or something appropriately awesome.

But at least he was helping Sammy, so maybe it would be okay.

He heard something muffled from behind him, but his head was so far in the water that he couldn't tell what was being said. It wasn't the Doctor—the voice was too young—and it wasn't Rose, either.

He felt a new hand, a smaller hand, on the back of his collar, pulling him out of the sink. He realized it was Sammy halfway through falling to the floor, and he tried very hard not to gasp too loud, not to let his knees shake too badly and tell Sammy how close he was to giving up to the gentle darkness in the corners of his eyes. He had to be the brave big brother, after all.

But Sammy wasn't doing so well, either. He stumbled over, and only then did Dean realize what had happened. Sammy hadn't figured out how to untie his hands, but he managed his legs well enough, and he charged at the rawhead like a football player. Not very effective, but surprising enough to knock the thing off balance.

But now it was mad, and that definitely wasn't a good thing.

"You okay, Dean?" Sammy squeaked.

Dean almost laughed. He'd been scared to death for his little brother; the kid had no business wasting his energy on worry for _him_. But he couldn't laugh because he still couldn't breathe properly.

The rawhead stalked towards Dean's little brother and kicked him aside. Sammy crumpled, and the rawhead grabbed him with rough hands and shoved him into the nearest cupboard. Despite its wrinkled, leathery fingers, it was nimble enough to lock the door before Sammy could burst through it again.

_Thump. Thump. Thump. _Sammy was using every ounce of energy he had left in his little body trying to bust the door open to the cupboard. Dean could hear his little brother shouting obscenities that he was proud to teach him—and others that he probably learned from Dad, because Dean knew even he didn't talk like that. He wanted to tell Sammy to conserve his energy, to save it for when it was his turn and not to waste his breath on Dean.

But Dean still couldn't talk, so Sammy just kept on pounding.

The girl Sammy had been captured with was still there, too. Useless. She didn't do anything at all except sit there and look terrified at everything that was happening.

(Dean knew he couldn't really blame her for being so scared. She was only a kid, after all, and she hadn't grown up knowing the things about the world that he did. But still. It was kind of frustrating to be fighting panic and water in your lungs and staring at that little girl at the same time.)

He definitely hadn't planned it like this. He was supposed to be the conquering hero. Sammy was supposed to watch him beat the bad guy. He was supposed to be invincible, at least for Sammy. Sammy had only just seen their Dad come home hurt from a hunt, and he didn't need to lose faith in anyone else. That was why Dean couldn't die today.

He'd just about got his hands free, too. Pocketknives were the best for situations like this, and besides, Dad taught him a trick or two. He'd been just conscious enough to remember to flex so that his muscles were bigger when he got tied up than when he relaxed—it gave him enough space to work with.

But he wasn't headed to the sink just yet. The rawhead knew he was a threat, and so first, apparently, it had decided to throw him around for a while.

_Crash_. Right into the nearest wall. He bit into his tongue and tasted blood, and the warm stuff quickly filled his mouth with the taste of rust. He winced as he felt something warm trickle down his neck as well. Like it hadn't been bad enough when he hit his head on the water faucet. Now the thing was aggravating the split. He'd need stitches when this was over.

Yeah, Dad was _not _going to be happy about that either.

_Slam_. Right into the other wall. Whatever breath he had managed to catch before was forced out of him, so of course that would be the perfect time for the rawhead to grab him and drag him into the kitchen again.

He just about had his hands free, too . . . .

He didn't remember falling unconscious. He only remembered when he came back out of it.

Once he'd fallen into that trap, that blissful sleep once, it was of course harder not to slip back into it. But it was also so much more painful when he came back out of it, because his lungs hurt and he was involuntarily coughing and he probably sounded so absolutely awful to Sammy. He had hoped he would just die and get this over with, but the rawhead was mad at him now. No quick death for Dean Winchester.

It took him a bit to realize that his hands were free. He wasn't thinking so well. It was hard to think with all those big purple spots getting in his way. But now that he realized that, he used it to his advantage. His head hit the water, but his hands hit the sides of the sink. He planned to pull a cool move like in the movies, do a handstand on the sink, and amaze the rawhead with his abilities. What really happened was that the force of Dean trying to push himself up knocked the rawhead over, and now he was free—no clammy fingers holding him down.

He didn't really think next. If he'd thought it through, he probably would have kicked the rawhead while it was down to buy himself a little more time. But he went straight to the cabinet, didn't even bother to find the key, just found the nearest heavy object and broke it open.

Sammy came tumbling out at about the same time the rawhead picked Dean up and flung him against the nearest wall. He blinked against the light, still trying to figure out what had happened.

"Sammy, get your stupid girlfriend and get out of here!" Dean shouted. He was surprised at how hoarse, how rough his voice sounded. It hurt even just to talk, but Sammy was in trouble and he could worry about his vocal chords when this was all over—if he made it out.

The rawhead was torn. Sammy was probably still a threat, and it could lose two children for the price of one. But then, this kid was _so _naughty, and whatever drove the thing to try and punish kids had to be nagging at him to teach Dean a lesson.

Dean beamed. Yeah, he was the bad son. Sammy was the good kid, the perfect son, never did anything wrong even when he did do something wrong. He wasn't nearly worth the rawhead's attention, not like Dean was.

Leathery eyes found Dean's, and Dean was surprised to find himself grinning. "Come and get me," he growled low in his throat—not because it was more threatening, which it was, but because talking low was about all he could do when his lungs felt like they were on fire.

Dean hit the wall again, but as the purple spots and black fuzziness returned to his vision, he saw with a grim smile that at least Sam had managed to get his girlfriend out the window.

Good. Sammy was safe. Dean could pass out now; Sammy would never know he'd been so uncool as to actually _faint_.


	16. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Seven

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

A/N: Slightly edited to take into account some reviews. You were right; the Doctor was a little off. I was trying to write him as "still not sure what to do with the Winchesters" but it came off as passive. Thanks for the help; I hope this helps a bit, and I've taken it into account in future chapters too.

...

They very nearly ran into the two ten-year-olds running from the house.

The little girl didn't stop running, but the little boy went straight for the Doctor and wrapped his arms around him, sobbing hysterically. "Doctor, Doctor, you have to save my brother!" he panted. His voice was muffle as he spoke mostly into the Doctor's knees, but the message was clear.

"This must be Sammy," the Doctor said, trying to pry the small but strong fingers off him. Here was one brother—but where was the other?

"Don't you remember me?" Sammy asked. He looked up at the Doctor with wide eyes. "I mean, I was a lot younger. I guess I look different. Dean said you were just pretend, but I told him he was lying to me, and I was right, wasn't I?"

The Doctor nodded. He didn't really know what else to do.

"Good, because I remember you being able to help him before. So go do your saving people thing," Sammy demanded. He had stopped crying now and stamped his foot, looking younger and younger the more he stamped.

The Doctor didn't need more prodding, and he didn't stop to make sure Sammy was okay; he knew Rose already had his hand. He charged at the house with Dean's invention thrust in front of him as if it could actually do real damage.

He burst through the door just as Dean went limp in the water, and the rawhead looked up with death in its eyes.

Dean.

The Doctor heard a growl and realized it was his own voice only after he charged. The rawhead leaped out of the way, but not before the Doctor managed to knock Dean to the ground as well—at least he was out of the water that way.

But now the rawhead was on the defense. And these things were faster and stronger than both humans and Time Lords. The Doctor was on the floor in a second, the electro-gadget just out of reach, leathery fingers wrapped around his throat and reddened eyes boring into his.

Dean wasn't moving, and there was a rawhead on top of him. Things didn't look very good. The Doctor coughed, trying to get some air, but the rawhead suffocated people for its food source; he didn't stand a chance.

And then there was a blur of movement above him, and a ten-year-old ball of fury hit the rawhead with everything he had. "Don't. Touch. My. Brother."

The sound of Sammy's voice seemed to rouse Dean, and he opened his eyes and immediately choked on the water in his lungs. He hacked and coughed, and that seemed to catch the rawhead's attention. Thing had a personal vendetta against him, apparently.

The rawhead reared back, growling in annoyance as it threw Sammy against the nearest wall with a deep _thud _and reached out for Dean, its fingers just missing Dean's hair as the Doctor tried to keep its legs rooted to the spot.

It paused for only a moment before it decided to abandon the Doctor and head right for Dean, who was close enough to death that at least the rawhead would get one meal out of all this trouble.

The Doctor saw his opening to crawl out from under the rawhead and run protectively to Sammy's side. "You okay?" he asked, helping Sammy to his feet and trying not to be too overbearing; these boys didn't seem to like that.

Sammy wiped his nose, doing his best to look indignant and not scared. "Of course I am. Me and Dean do this kinda stuff all the time."

The Doctor rolled his eyes. Yep. He could definitely tell this kid had been raised by Dean Winchester. "You should really run."

Yeah right. Sammy wasn't going anywhere.

Dean coughed again some more, but he rolled away from the approaching rawhead. Good thing, too. (Even so, if Sammy hadn't rushed past the Doctor to grab the thing around the ankles and tripped it up, Dean would probably have died. The rawhead had murder in its eyes.)

But Dean was craftier than that. Even half-dead, he had a plan. He'd rolled with a purpose, and now his hand was on his electro-gadget, finger on the trigger. With a reckless shout, he caught the rawhead's attention once more and smiled grimly. He pulled . . .but nothing happened except some intense beeping. He frowned as the rawhead turned towards him, its eyes wide. "What did you do to my beautiful invention?" he shouted at the Doctor.

The Doctor frowned. "I modified it to track the creature."

"Yeah, well, _un_modify it. I don't have time for this nonsense," Dean muttered. He pushed the gadget across the floor at the Doctor and then scrambled to his knees—not quite to his feet, but that was what he could manage for the moment.

The Doctor frowned, but he knew he didn't have time for the usual arguments. They didn't have much choice, and the Doctor didn't like to think what would happen to Dean if they didn't get rid of this rawhead soon.

"What's that?" Sammy asked as the Doctor pulled out his sonic screwdriver.

The Doctor's entire face lit up. "This is my sonic screwdriver. Like it?"

Instead of smiling, as the Doctor expected, Sammy just screwed up his face. "What's that supposed to mean? What does it do?"

"Sammy?" Dean cried out in exasperation as he slammed a cabinet door into the rawhead's knee to slow it down. "Do you really think now is the time to be talking shop?"

Sammy frowned. "Right." He held out his hand to Rose, who had been dragging Dean's book bag behind her and fishing around for something to help. (It took her a little longer to arrive on the scene, and she was nursing a limp where a size two shoe print announced its way across her shins. She must have tried to stop Sammy from getting himself into trouble and found out what happened when these two were separated.) She seemed to understand Sammy's look and handed him the bag.

Rose frowned as Sammy dug out the gun. The Doctor couldn't blame her. It was bad enough that Sammy was ten and already involved in this hunting game, but the gun handling made it somehow worse, more tangible. But she didn't say anything.

"Sammy, you idiot, that won't kill it and you know it!" Dean shouted from behind the cabinet door he was now using as a shield.

The Doctor wholeheartedly agreed, but he was busy working on Dean's invention. He had restored it to the original settings and was now trying to set in an overload switch: a blast bright enough to stun the rawhead and let the boys get away.

"It'll slow it down," Sammy retorted. And just to prove it, he fired off a couple shots at the rawhead.

Bad move. Now the rawhead turned its attention away from Dean and towards the smaller brother. And as much as Sammy thought he knew how to hunt, he obviously hadn't done this before. He'd almost forgotten to take off the safety, and the blast had knocked him off his feet.

The Doctor straightened up with a grin. He'd fixed Dean's electrogadget.

He hadn't seen Dean beside him until Dean was grabbing his invention away and firing. Kid moved fast. Last the Doctor saw, he was hiding in a cabinet.

"If you set it on this . . . ." The Doctor started to explain his plan, but Dean wasn't listening.

The air crackled with the sting of electricity as Dean fired, and the rawhead crumpled in seconds. It lay, unmoving, on the floor, just inches away from Sammy, its fingers outstretched as it tried to take at least one of the brothers with it.

"What . . . ." Dean paused, panting for breath. "What took you so long?" He grinned casually, but his gaze never left Sammy. (The Doctor couldn't tell if that was because Sammy had been in danger or because he was desperate to show his little brother that he was unbeatable.)

The Doctor rolled his eyes, and Sammy just laughed. "They were your backup? I thought you said never to trust other hunters except Uncle Bobby."

Dean just shrugged. "They aren't hunters, though. And besides, they're childhood friends . . . sort of."

Sammy just laughed again. He ran up and hugged Dean tight. "Thanks for coming to get me," he said, his voice muffled by the leather of Dean's much-too-big-for-him jacket.

The Doctor smiled as he watched Dean completely melt. The tough hunter exterior was suddenly stripped away, and instead, here was a little lost boy who finally found his family. Sammy was the world to this kid.

"Just don't tell Dad we went hunting without him. He'd totally kill me."

"Really?" Rose asked, her eyes narrowed. "Why keep secrets from your family? Wouldn't your dad be proud of you for saving all the kids in this town?"

Both boys were frowning now—deep frowns that reached their eyes. Neither of them spoke for a while before, at last, Sammy spoke up. "Well, I know my brother is a hero, _you _know he's a hero, and he doesn't need Dad to tell him that, too."

Sammy's logic was sound, and the Doctor would have agreed except for the look on Dean's face—the quiet desperation. Dean definitely wanted his dad to see what he could do. To prove he was a hunter.

The little-boy hurt in Dean's eyes struck at the Doctor's heart. He didn't remember making the conscious decision to get up and cross the room, but suddenly he was hooking his arm around Dean's head and rubbing his head and hair in a massive noogie.

Rose laughed when Dean made only a half-hearted attempt to get away from the Doctor. Then, the laugh caught in her throat as she stepped through the floorboards and hit something with a sickening crunch.

They all fell silent as Rose looked down; they already knew what they were going to see. But they looked anyway, whether out of morbid curiosity or because they could not stand not knowing for sure, they could not tell.

Bones.

"Bloody bones," Dean said quietly to himself. He probably hadn't meant to freak Sammy out; he was just referring to the poem the Doctor said earlier. But Sammy was shaking beside him.

"I want to go home, Dean," Sammy whispered. He hadn't meant for the Doctor to hear, but the Doctor had excellent hearing.

"Well," the Doctor said slowly, "it looks like everyone's safe now."

"At least for the future," Dean muttered, still staring at the bones. (Sammy looked like he was going to be sick.) At last, Dean noticed the green state of his little brother and frowned. "Well, I think we've caused enough damage for one day. We done good, and it's time to celebrate. This calls for pie!"

...

A/N: Yes, this is where the Doctor learns about Dean's love of pie. And if you haven't been shipping Dean/pie since the beginning of time, you are wrong. :P


	17. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Eight

A/N: SORRY SORRY SORRY! I ALWAYS update by Tuesdays, but when I went to update last night, I realized I had accidentally uploaded the wrong chapter (the unfinished chapter nine) and accidentally saved over this one, so I had to get out my notebook and retype my written draft and ... yeah. It was crazy. Anyway, yesterday was Tuesday, but today is Tuesday too! So here, have a chapter!

Disclaimer: I still don't own the rights or related rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural.

...

Dean loved pie.

Sure, there were other things—cakes and burgers and _oh man _were cheeseburgers delicious—but pie won out for Dean's favorite dessert. Maybe because Mom made it when she was tired or stressed or angry. It was her go-to snack and . . . well, he told Sammy they had the perfect family before, but Mom was alone a lot and made a lot of pies. Now that Dean was older, he knew what the stress cooking meant.

But it was hard to go wrong with pies anyway. No matter where he went, they were always good. And if you got the really fresh, really steamy ones . . . . Well, then it was just like being four again.

He swung his legs carelessly over the barstool, finishing up his second piece of pie. The Doctor and Sammy were having spinning contests on their stools while Rose cheered them on. Dean's hair was starting to dry, and his mood lifted with every bit of pie and every bout of giggles from the people next to him.

"You have a cute family," the waitress said to Dean as she handed him his third slice (the Doctor was paying, so Dean was going to eat as much as he wanted). "Your dad seems cool."

"Oh, he's not my dad," Dean said quickly, wrinkling his nose. The Doctor was definitely not his dad, not even close to family. "He's just . . . ," Dean paused, searching for the right words, "a friend of the family."

"I see," the waitress said with a smile as the Doctor fell off the stool "accidentally" and sent Sammy into peals of laughter.

Dean smiled, too. "He's like a crazy uncle," he said, finally finding the words. "Shows up with no warning with a new girl and adventures to share."

He hadn't realized Rose was listening in until she dropped the glass in her hand. The Doctor and Sammy were now wrestling (the Doctor let Sammy pin him all too easily) and didn't hear the noise, but Dean jumped down from his stool to help out the overwhelmed blonde.

"You okay?" he whispered.

Rose nodded, but her hands were shaky. As they picked up the glass together, she asked, "What did you mean by 'new girl'? Did the Doctor replace me?"

Dean froze. He didn't know what to do now. He could see the pain, the fear, the hurt and terror on her face and knew he had to lie. "He never got over you after you left," he said, trying to dig into younger memories. "His new friend said he was always hung up on something—someone—else." Okay, so it was stretching the truth. All he really knew was that Doctor Jones liked the Doctor and didn't get anything back. But Rose needed a pick-me-up.

Rose frowned again. "I've always known he would outlive me, but hearing about his future without me . . . ." She shook her head sadly.

Dean frowned. "You're younger than he is," he pointed out.

Rose laughed. "Oh, you have no idea."

"But if he's older, wouldn't that mean _you _would outlive _him_?"

Rose laughed again. "You still have a lot to learn about the Doctor."

Dean pushed aside the last crumbs of Piece Number Three. "Enlighten me," he said, crossing his arms and giving her his best "serious" face.

Rose frowned and looked over her shoulder at the Doctor. "I'm not the one to ask."

Dean sighed. That was exactly not the answer he wanted to hear, even if he had known as soon as he asked that it would be the answer she gave. The Doctor was good at being mysterious even though he was also good at giving everything away. And talking to the Doctor was a minefield, trying to diffuse a bomb, or something equally dangerous. For one thing, he didn't know who Dan was yet, not really, and he didn't like hunters, and that was all he had going for him.

And the Doctor was still such a mystery in so many ways, and it made Dean nervous. There was something very inhuman about the guy, and Dean was trying desperately to avoid that. He didn't want to have to kill his friend, not when he didn't have very many to start out with.

But he would. If he had to. Those were the rules.

"Blimey, that's right! You were supposed to do some homework!" the Doctor said suddenly, though his voice was muffled as Sammy sat on his shoulders to pin him to the ground and then stood up and bowed to an imaginary crowd.

Dean jumped up, looked at the clock, and groaned. "It's too late to go back to your girlfriend's house for your shoebox!"

"She's not my girlfriend," Sammy insisted, but his face was such a bright red that Dean knew different. Atta boy, Sammy.

The Doctor perked up at the mention of a shoebox. "Oh, are you doing a panorama?" He beamed. "I used to love those things! Susan had to make them all the time for . . . ." He trailed off.

Dean knew that look. That look was the Reason for hunters. Nobody ever chose this life—they were either born into it or forced into knowledge that they didn't want when the supernatural reared its ugly head and forced them to see the truth. And the Doctor had the look.

And it was an unwritten rule: never, _ever _ask about the Reason. Sammy had long ago learned not to ask about Mom, and Dean never asked Uncle Bobby why he sometimes looked so sad when he played catch with Dean instead of going shooting with him. But the Doctor . . . .

There was nothing else for it. Dean had to ask. "Who did you lose?"

Sammy stared at Dean, too surprised to move. Rose frowned at him, and the Doctor stiffened. But then, surprisingly, the Doctor softened. He slumped into a chair and passed a hand over his face and then grabbed a hunk of his hair. "You know I'm not from . . . this time and place," the Doctor said carefully. (There it was again, the nagging feeling in the back of Dean's mind. But the Doctor was being open, and Dean was definitely not going to ruin the moment. Dean decided not to press him for details, especially because it was rude enough that Dean had even dared to ask about the Reason.) "But my home . . . my people . . . they're all gone."

Dean was the one at a loss for words this time, and Sammy stepped up to the plate. "But if you have this time machine, can't you go back and save them? You save people all the time!"

The Doctor's smile was so sad that Sammy didn't even wait for the Doctor to say anything. He just reached up and wrapped his little arms around the Doctor's neck. Sammy was always doing stuff like that. Kid was way too in touch with his emotions. Maybe Dean should rethink his parenting techniques.

But the Doctor snatched Sammy up and hugged him close and tight. "Hey," he said quietly, "I helped my granddaughter do shoeboxes all the time back when she insisted on classic Earth schools." He set Sammy down and playfully ruffled his hair. "I bet we could get something together for your class."

Sammy's entire face lit up. "Do you have a shoebox?"

"Better than that!" And then the Doctor was off, pulling levers and pressing buttons and hitting things with a hammer. Dean heard the familiar sound of a screeching time machine engine.

Sammy laughed in delight and grabbed hold of one of the handrails to keep his balance. "Where are we going?" he asked.

"I don't know. You choose—do you want to do your project on a rain forest? An ocean?"

"A desert," Sammy said. "My . . . friend . . . ." He stopped and glanced at Dean to make sure he wasn't going to say something about a girlfriend. "My _friend_," he said again, glaring at Dean, who was barely keeping his mouth shut, "is going a rain forest, and I don't want her to think I used her."

Dean opened his mouth to explain to his little brother that no matter what he did, his girlfriend would think he ditched her on purpose. But then Sammy glared at him and he backed up and somehow ended up sitting next to Rose. He looked over at her to roll his eyes at the Doctor and Sammy's antics, but something in her expression stopped him. "Hey," he said as he leaned forward, "what's wrong?"

Rose frowned and looked away. "I'm fine."

"Yeah right." He scooted closer to Rose and noticed again that she was really pretty. And then his mouth moved faster than his head and he said, "You know you're much sexier when you smile."

At that, she did smile and swatted at him. "Still a flirt, I see."

"Stick with what you're good at—that's what I say," Dean said with a wink. "Seriously, though, you doing okay?"

Rose shrugged and sighed. "I just forget sometimes that he had this whole other life before he met me."

Dean frowned as the lightbulb finally went off in his head. "Susan," he said.

"I mean, I knew he was old enough to be a grandfather, and I knew he had kids, but I guess . . . ." She shook her head. "Like finding out he was a father in the first place wasn't weird enough."

Dean laughed. "Well, I'm sure his kids will like you." He realized his mistake and quickly amended, "I mean, they would . . . if they were still around." He glanced over at the Doctor and was relieved to see the time traveler hadn't heard. He was busy laughing with Sammy, and the loneliness was a little less evident on his face.

Dean leaned back with his eyes closed and tried not to think about how much he wanted to help these strangers. Instead, he listened to the groaning and creaking as the TARDIS trembled with the strain of the engines.


	18. Book Two: Introduction, Chapter Nine

A/N: After last night's episode, I was so full of feels I couldn't sleep. So here. Have another chapter!

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

The Doctor opened the door of the TARDIS and bounded out into the sunlight. It was bright and warm, and he took off his coat and rolled up his sleeves—not because he was hot, really, but because Dean still thought the Doctor was human, and the Doctor really didn't want to let go of a good friendship just because of a hunter's prejudice, so he'd pretend for just a little while longer. He'd tell Dean the truth . . . eventually . . . when he was ready to accept it.

Sammy tumbled out the open door after him, throwing off his jacket as he went. "Wow," he whispered once his eyes adjusted to the brightness. "What is this place?"

"Welcome to the early years of the Sahara Desert," the Doctor announced with his arms outstretched. He grinned and waited for the explosion of enthusiasm that usually followed a trip in the TARDIS, but Sammy just sat there, quietly taking it all in.

Dean poked his head out the door as well and tried his very best not to look impressed. (He covered for it mostly by taking off his much-too-big leather jacket and folding it neatly and precisely over the TARDIS railing. Must have been some jacket.) But he had that boyish twinkle in his eye, and the Doctor knew he was thrilled.

The Doctor beamed and swung Sammy up onto his shoulders. (Good thing Sammy was such a small kid.) "Let's find some rocks and small plant life for your project, shall we?"

Dean snorted and leaned against the side of the TARDIS. "You two nerds have fun with that. I'll just stay here."

"And do what?" Sammy asked.

Dean didn't say anything at first, but the Doctor could see the exhaustion just behind his eyes. Dean was not going to admit to napping with Sammy around, though, so he just shrugged. "Something not nerdy."

The Doctor shrugged right back. "Suit yourself. Rose, you coming?"

Rose finally poked her head back out the door. She had changed her outfit for the weather—now, she was wearing a tank top and denim shorts and sunglasses. She smelled just a little bit like spray-on sunscreen. "I'm ready!" she declared.

The Doctor grinned. "Lovely. You look lovely," he declared.

Rose blushed.

The Doctor left Dean to "guard" the TARDIS—with a rolled up jacket for a pillow and a red picnic blanket underneath him—and took off running as fast as he dared with a little boy clinging to his hair. "Tell me if you see anything you want to use for your project."

Rose jogged easily beside him and smiled up at Sammy. "So what do you think, Sammy? Of this whole time travel thing?"

Sammy stiffened up a little bit. "It's Sam. My name is Sam." He sniffed. "Sammy is a little girl name."

Rose was obviously trying not to laugh as Sam tried to make himself look bigger. "Right. Of course. Sorry." Her voice warbled with barely hidden giggles. "Sorry," she said again, "it's just that Dean calls you Sammy, and that's how we know you."

Sammy sniffed again. "Only Dean is allowed to call me that."

The Doctor and Rose shared smirks, but Sammy didn't see because he was so high up on the Doctor's shoulders.

"Let me down," Sammy said suddenly, and the Doctor knelt in the hot sand so he could jump off. He stepped down and picked up a single rock and shoved it in his pocket. The Doctor grinned. It was a little boy's treasure—smoothed and rounded by sandstorms over the years and striped with different colors. And it would look brilliant in a little shoebox.

Rose stood next to the Doctor and grinned up at him. "You're very good at this, you know."

"At what?"

"This whole dad thing."

The Doctor couldn't decide whether to smile or frown, so he just raised his eyebrow at her. He remembered the look she gave him when he mentioned being a father. It had been very different from the look she was giving him now. Maybe she'd accepted that part of his past and wanted to be supported. In that case, he should smile.

But then he thought of Susan. Of the Time Lords and Gallifrey and the never-ending darkness that ruined the burnt-orange sky. He remembered begging the universe to give him another way out, to let them live. So maybe he shouldn't smile.

Rose didn't know what was going through his mind, but she knew he needed her—she always knew—and she reached for his hand and laced her fingers through his. "I'd have liked to meet them. Your family."

Oh, now it was getting a little too dicey. Time to backtrack. He shook his head. "Nah," he said quickly. "You wouldn't have liked them. Stiff and stuffy, you know. And they were a real bore at parties." He plastered on his best grin and knew she knew he was bluffing.

But Rose was good. She was very good. She didn't say anything, just held his hand tighter and pretended to suddenly be much more interested in little Sammy as he collected rocks and sand and pieces of a little bush he managed to find.

The Doctor was grateful for the distraction. "You finding anything good for your schoolwork?"

Sammy grinned and held up a lizard by the tail and then let out a cry of surprise when the lizard left its tail behind. He looked distressed as he glanced up at the Doctor. "Did I hurt it?" he asked, his eyes wide.

The Doctor shook his head, trying not to smile at the doe-eyed innocent look. How Sammy could have possibly been born to be a hunter was well beyond his comprehension of the universe's sense of humor. "Some lizards do that," the Doctor said. "It's a defense mechanism in case a predator managed to—" Here, he snatched Sammy up in his arms. "—grab hold of it." He then tickled Sammy right in between his ribs and teased, "Wouldn't that be useful about now?"

Sammy didn't answer; he was laughing too hard.

After they calmed down from the tickling match, Sammy brushed himself off and looked up at the Doctor. "I want to know lots of things like you do."

"Too right," the Doctor said. "You can never know enough; that's what I'm always saying!"

"Along with a lot of other things," Rose teased him.

"Also right," the Doctor said. "Me, I'm always talking. But you know something, Sammy Boy?"

"It's Sam."

"Of course it is," the Doctor said. He thought briefly of Mickey and Ricky and decided that both Mickey and Sammy had the same face when they tried to assert their own names. "You know something, Sam?"

"What?"

"You've already got a good thing going for you. You _want _to learn, and that's brilliant!" He shook his head out for emphasis on that last part. "Find books! Lots of books. And read them all, Sammy. You're going to be fantastic; I'll bet the world."

Sammy grinned and laughed as the Doctor tickled him again, but before long, they were right back down to business gathering rocks and sand. Only this time, Sammy was much more inquisitive. One question about a lizard and he was just dying to learn more.

"Why is the rock different colors like this?" or "Why is everything so smooth?" or "How come the air looks like it's kind of wavy when you look really far in the distance?"

The Doctor laughed as he answered Sammy's questions and then shot back with more of his own. At first, Sammy was wary of anything that seemed like prying, but soon, he warmed up to the Doctor.

"Why don't we hear about more time travelers except in stories?" Sammy asked. He had moved on from climatology and into the realm of time and space.

"Oh, there's laws against interfering in timelines," the Doctor shrugged.

"He usually ignores them," Rose chimed in with a grin. (The Doctor stuck his tongue out at her.)

Now it was the Doctor's turn for a question. "How long have you and your brother been hunters?"

"All my life. Dean's been doing it since he was four."

The Doctor frowned. "Four?"

"Uh-uh. My turn," Sammy said. (He had set up the rules long ago that there was only one question allowed at a time, and he was a stickler for the rules.) "If there are laws about time traveling, who keeps track of them?"

Again, the Doctor frowned—this time because he wasn't sure how much he could say without making Sammy suspicious. "My people used to do that. They were called Time Lords, and they made sure that no one messed around with history."

Sammy thought about that one for a while. "Oh," he said at last. "Okay. I get it. It's like a title. Time Lords. Lords over time. It seems kinda Middle Ages, though, doesn't it?"

The Doctor just laughed; he didn't want to explain much further than that, and besides, it _did _seem kind of Middle Ages—a perfect name for a people stuck in their own traditions and unwilling to change and see the beauty of taking a TARDIS for a spin through time and space. "My turn. What got you started into hunting?"

Sammy's frown was deeper than the Doctor's. "Dean says we're not supposed to talk about it. Maybe you should ask a different question."

"Okay. Do you always do what Dean says?"

Sammy glanced around as if Dean could possibly be hiding anywhere in the miles of sand around them. When he was sure the coast was clear, he leaned in close to the Doctor. "Don't tell him this, but sometimes I don't do what he says just to see what he'll do. Also because he's not the boss of me and I like to remind him of that."

"Well done," the Doctor said approvingly. Sammy didn't strike him as the blindly obedient type.

"My turn," Sammy said. "How do you become a Time Lord? Do you think if I studied really hard and researched laws and stuff they would let me be one and make sure nobody breaks the Time Laws?"

Sammy looked up at him with such hope and innocence in his eyes that the Doctor wanted nothing more than to lie. But before the Doctor could decide what to say, they heard a single shotgun blast breaking into the sticky silence of the desert heat.

Sammy didn't miss a beat. "Dean!" he shouted and took off in the direction of the gunshot.


	19. Book Three: Ape, Chapter One

A/N: I have a "season" planned out up to a certain point in the Supernatural's timeline (not telling you what because SPOILERS) and if there's enough of a positive reaction, I have at least another season of possibilities. We'll see.

Disclaimers: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

There was something safe and comforting about sleeping in the shade of the TARDIS. He hadn't slept like this in a long time, with deep breaths and without keeping an eye out for Sammy in case he sniffled or something.

But he should have known. He should have paid attention. It was never worth his own personal satisfaction to let his guard down.

"What is it?" hissed an unfamiliar voice.

"The ape can't have made it. There are words on the top"

"Perhaps it simply copied our letterings. I have never heard of a police box," said the first voice.

Dean froze. He felt his hand on the shotgun beneath his rolled up jacket-pillow, but first he needed to gauge the situation. He peeked one eye open.

While he was sleeping, two . . . creatures had managed to sneak up on him. They were green and scaly and not at all like anything he and Dad had ever faced before. He wasn't even sure if bullets would stop them. Not to mention the fact that they were loaded with rock salt.

Dean gritted his teeth. Well, if nothing else, a good shot would distract them long enough for him to get a head start and warn Sammy and the Doctor about the monsters blocking the TARDIS doors.

He jumped to his feet and pulled out the shotgun at the same time. In one, fluid motion, he had the nearest monster in his sights and fired.

Down went the monster, but not because Dean hit it. These things were fast, and they both dropped to dodge Dean's shot.

Dean swore under his breath. Now he didn't have the element of surprise, and he definitely couldn't outrun these things to warn his friends. And now he'd shot at them, and that stupid doctor was probably going to come running toward the danger and bring Sammy right into it.

"Consider that a warning shot," Dean said, trying to sound braver than he actually felt. He'd have been fine if he just knew what these things were, but he was stuck in the dark, and he absolutely no idea where to go from here. Maybe, if he said he hadn't been shooting to kill, they would think he was more dangerous.

"The ape is more intelligent than the others," said the second creature. "Listen to it speak!"

"The language is still blindly aggressive of course," said the first. "And it carries weapons."

"Yeah. I've got a gun," Dean said shakily. "So stay back!" He didn't know anything about these creatures, but he knew for sure he didn't like the way they called him "ape."

"It must be some kind of genetic anomaly," the second thing said. "The other apes ate nowhere near this level of intelligence.

Despite everything, Dean smiled. Score one for Dean in the "Sammy is the smarter brother" category.

"We should bring the specimen in for future analysis."

"Look at the forehead. So misshapen compared to others of its species."

"And the weapon is not one of ours. Is it possible the ape made it?"

"No hair, either. It must be some kind of mutation."

The creatures were getting closer, so Dean shot again. This time, the creatures were not fast enough, and Dean managed to hit one—right in the collarbone, or at least where the collarbone should be if there was any sense to their anatomy. The shot didn't kill the creature, but it sure knocked it flat and knocked all the wind out of it.

The uninjured thing hissed at him and charged so fast that Dean didn't even have time to reload. "You stupid ape!" the thing shouted as it tackled Dean and knocked the gun out of his hands.

Dean didn't hesitate in scrambling for his gun, but he was just a little bit slower than the lizard creature, and he felt a sharp jab in the base of his neck before his hands felt suddenly weak. And then his arms. His legs. His nose . . . .

The uninjured creature helped its friend to its feet. "Are you hurt?"

"Nothing I can't walk away from," the second creature said as it dusted the salt off its clothes. Its forked tongue flicked out to taste the bits on its face, and it tilted its head back in surprise. "Rock salt."

"An ape with a weapon of salt?"

The second one paused. "Do you suppose this one was trained by hunters?"

"Rubbish. Even the hunters know better than to trust the apes," the first said quickly, then seemed to think better of it. "Although . . . it _would _explain the ape's ability to speak. The late Madame Suvius wrote a paper on the apes' learning abilities. They are especially good at mimicry."

"So you think it's some hunter's trained pet?"

"It's one possible explanation, yes."

"Should we look for its owner?"

"And give it back to a crazed hunter to use again? That would be unethical."

Dean was still conscious but unable to move. He couldn't even get his tongue started so he could tell these morons that he was _definitely _not anyone's pet. He couldn't even ask about the hunters around here.

It wasn't surprising that monsters knew about hunters, but if Dean didn't look like a hunter, what did humans look like? Cavemen?

"The military would love to get its hands on the salt weapon," said the first creature.

"They'd probably dissect the ape before we could study it."

Dissect? Study? If Dean could have moved his muscles, he would have tensed up or even shivered. For now, he could only hear his heart beating faster and could taste the sand in his nose and mouth.

"Perhaps we could retrain it and undo the damage done—at least enough to release it back into the wild."

"Something really should be done in the High Council about animal cruelty laws."

Okay. Dean was definitely confused.

The uninjured creature stooped down and picked Dean's head up in the sand. "I wonder if its owner somehow changed its physiology to make it different from the other apes."

The second creature shrugged and reached into a pocket on its tunic. Dean saw the flash of something metal and then nothing.

…..

When he woke up again, he could actually move, and that was a huge deal. He reveled in the feeling of moving his fingers, his nose, licking his dry lips.

But he only took a few second for himself. No relaxing. He forced his eyes open no matter how much he wanted to slip back into oblivion. That was the thing about being knocked out. It felt good, peaceful, quiet. And it was really easy to slip back. But Dean knew how to force himself awake. He'd had practice.

He glanced around, trying to take in his surroundings. Honestly, he had expected to wake up in some hold in the ground or a cave somewhere surrounded by the bones of other unlucky humans and maybe even hanging upside down by his heels. But instead, he was standing upright in some kind of pod with what looked like glass or crystal surrounding him. He couldn't see out very far, not when the intricate crystal patterns refracted the light so much. So he couldn't see what was happening outside the pod. Super. They were probably preparing a soup to cook him in.

Dean went to reach for his backpack, but he didn't get very far. He could only lift his hands up a couple inches before some kind of leathery strap stopped him. He gritted his teeth and glanced around him, but he couldn't see his backpack or any other tools that might be useful. He was stuck.

Dean groaned out loud. He'd been caught twice in just twenty-four hours! He definitely needed to train more. Play less catch than Bobby. Practice shooting while Sammy did his homework. Go on more low-level hunts on his own so he was ready for higher-level bad guys with backup. This was definitely not going to happen again. The crystal door to his pod opened with a hiss, and another one of those lizard creatures looked inside. This one was wearing a white apron and gloves. He looked sort of like a doctor.

Great. Super. A lizard doctor monster. All of Dean's least favorite things.

"You're making a big mistake," he growled. (He figured threats were the only weapons he had left.) "I've got some dangerous friends out there, and they're going to be looking for me." Well, that was a lie. Sammy was just a kid, Rose was nice but not really hunter material. And doctor Jones had said the Doctor was dangerous, but Dean hadn't seen any proof of that, and the Doctor seemed more like a hippie or a peace protestor or something.

Dean's threat made the creature pause. "Interesting," it said. "Are you actually forming an argument?"

"Oh, for crying out—yes. Yes I can talk, you morons. Why is that so hard for you stupid lizards to understand?"

For a moment, the lizard doctor stared at him. Then, it brought some kind of device up to its mouth. "Subject exhibits the ability to hold conversation and even form arguments. Is it possible the apes are evolving into a more intelligent species? Further study is recommended." He closed the device (which looked a lot like a Star Trek communicator, and Dean would have thought it was cool if he wasn't pinned down in enemy territory) and set it down on a metal table filled with other metal devices—medical tools that looked sharp and painful. The lizard doctor reached for one of the sharp, pokey things and scooted closer. "Now," the thing said, "let's see what makes you so different from the other apes."

Dean grimaced. This was gonna hurt.


	20. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Two

A/N: People keep liking this story and I don't know what's wrong with all of you :P

Public Service Announcement: Also, I am graduating college in four weeks, so there may or may not be a celebratory spike in the number of chapters immediately followed by a week-and-a-half-long drop in which I am gone getting married two weeks after graduation. Just so you know.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related right.

"Where is my brother?" Sammy demanded. He'd dropped everything—his rocks, his lizard tail, everything—and glared up at the Doctor, every muscle tense and ready to pounce.

"He can't have got far," Rose said quickly. She knelt down in the hot sand and felt around for clues. But sand doesn't leave much by way of evidence.

The Doctor threw open the doors to the TARDIS and jumped over the safety railing without thinking about it. He rushed to the controls and fiddled around until he got the viewport up and running. "Initiate safety protocol 75-slash-apple-slash-42," he said. "Voice command."

"What are you doing?" Rose asked as she pulled a nearly-hysterical Sammy into the TARDIS after her. ("Where is my brother?" he kept shouting and pulled at her. If she hadn't kept a tight grip on him, he would be running out in the middle of the desert and getting lost.) "Doctor, what's happening?"

"It's the first rule. I always tell them: don't wander off," the Doctor said. "And then I go and leave Dean behind."

"Safety protocol initiated," the TARDIS told him.

"Atta girl," he said with a lopsided grin as he pulled the viewport closer to him.

"Doctor?" Sammy asked. He sounded small and hopeful, and he wasn't trying to get out the door anymore. Instead, he was standing beside the Doctor and grabbed a fistful of his jacket.

"I bring you lot on adventures, and you go wondering off and getting into trouble," the Doctor said by way of explanation. "And I thought it might be a good idea for the TARDIS scanners to keep an eye out when you're close enough to her to be monitored without putting too much of a strain on my old girl." He patted the TARDIS console affectionately as he scanned through the recorded images until he saw something moving in one of them.

"There," Rose said. She saw it too.

They let the footage play out, watching with open mouths. The Doctor recognized them right off: Silurians. That was rotten luck. Of course they'd stumble into the one member of their group who shot first and never asked questions if you weren't human. Typical.

"What are those things?" Sammy asked. He hadn't let go of the Doctor yet.

"They're Silurians," the Doctor said gently, then winced when he saw Dean shooting at them. "They lived on this planet long before humans evolved," he said, "and they had an advanced society—probably more advanced than you lot right now."

"So what are they doing here?"

"They live here," the Doctor said. "This is their home. And they probably think they've just discovered a new species of human. You lot hadn't even discovered fire at this point." He squinted at the screen and winced again as he saw Dean go limp. He wished he'd thought to install audio on this protocol, but he wanted the TARDIS to be able to rest when she could. She was getting old and run-down.

"What have they done with Dean?" Sammy demanded. And the Doctor could see it, the hunter inside Sammy. It wasn't as obvious as with Dean, but maybe that was because what you saw with Dean was what you got. But Sammy had been raised by Dean, and now he was glaring at the Silurians on the screen with the murderous glare Dean gave rawheads.

"I think he'll be okay—"

"You _think_?"

"He should be fine," the Doctor amended quickly. "The Silurians were a warrior race, but they were also curious and highly scientific." He stared at the viewport a little longer. "They didn't kill him, even after he shot at them. But where would they take him?" He hit the scanner as if that would help her range beyond what had already been recorded.

"We've gotta go after him!" Sammy said. "If those Silo-people have him, he could be in serious danger!"

The Doctor frowned and replayed the footage, looking for any details he might have missed that could be helpful. Couldn't even take a short field trip without losing somebody . . . . When the Doctor looked up again, Sammy was gone—and Rose with him.

He puffed out all his breath at once and said to no one in particular, "Don't wander off. I always say that. No wandering off. And what do they do? Every time!" He threw his hands in the air.

But he smiled despite it all. Who was he kidding? He could never travel with anyone who wasn't curious enough to have Wandering Off Syndrome.

"Rose?" he called out. He hadn't heard the door open, but then, he had been so focused on the viewport that maybe Sammy let himself out. (His companions were always oh-so-good at striking out on their own—no plan, no prior knowledge, just a rush into danger.) The Doctor sighed, unrolled his sleeves, and stepped out the TARDIS door.

Right into a Silurian.

The Doctor fumbled to close the door behind him—he saw their guns—and then quickly held up his hands. "Look, look," he said, showing both sides of his hands. "I'm unarmed. I'm not a threat. See?" He grinned at them, and then—he couldn't help it—he started to gush. "Oh, but look at you lot. It's the height of the Silurian civilization, and look at what you've done for yourselves!" He beamed again. Their uniforms were clean and pressed, their technology new. It was nice to see them in their element and not dusty and old and trying to battle their way into humanity's place on Earth.

The three Silurians glanced at each other and then at the Doctor, confused.

"Ah, yes," the Doctor said, realizing the problem. "Right. I'm not an ape, you lot." He pointed to his chest. "See? Two hearts. Time Lord. Hello!" He wiggled his fingers in greeting.

"You look like an ape."

"No, they look like us. Cross-spatial . . . ." He shook his head. "Never mind. It's not the time." He had sufficiently confused the Silurians now, and so he pressed forward. "You haven't seen my friend, have you?" he asked. He held his hand up to about shoulder height. "He's about so high, light hair, shoots at anything that moves/' He waited for a response. "No? Nothing? Not ringing any bells?"

"I heard legends of the Time Lords," one Silurian said at last. "But they were sworn not to interfere."

"Yes, of course," the Doctor said quickly. "No interfering. That's me. But my young companion doesn't operate under the same laws I do." He grinned. "We were, well, just passing through, stopping for a quick vacation, and my friend lost his way."

The Silurians all turned toward each other. They shared a look, and finally, the leader stepped forward. "I'll have to ask you to come with us."

"I really just want to find—"

"We have our orders," the leader said. (The Doctor frowned. That was his least favorite excuse; it had been used far too often to justify the worst of the universe.) "The blue box comes with us, along with any altered apes we find along the way."

The Doctor frowned. "Now, see, not an ape." He pointed to his chest again.

"Right. We might believe you if we didn't already have your ape friend," said the leader. He jerked his head along with his gun. "Now get moving, ape."

The Doctor sighed but kept his hands raised. Stubborn, these Silurians.

The other Silurians gathered around the TARDIS to lift it, grunting and groaning, and then looked at each other, surprised by how heavy a simple box was.

"Oh, do please be careful with that," the Doctor said. "She's getting on now, my old girl, and I don't want to see a scratch on her."

"What have you got in here?" one Silurian moaned.

"Oh, odds and ends," the Doctor grinned casually. "I think I still have a set of Jamie's old bagpipes, come to think of it. That could be loud if you tip my TARDIS too far." He frowned. "I keep thinking that I really need to go through the TARDIS storage. I'm a bit of a pack rat."

The Silurians glanced at each other again, probably unsure how to deal with such an apparently chatty ape when apes could hardly speak in more than grunts in their time. Finally, the leader spoke up again. "Can you open it?"

The Doctor paused. "Well," he said slowly, "that might not be such a good idea."

And then there was a gun in his face. The Doctor sighed. "Oi, what is it with you lot and guns? You're supposed to be more advanced than this!"

"The violent apes have forced us to take more drastic measures," the Silurian said. "And besides, the war with the Sea Devils has enhanced both our militaries."

"Oh right," the Doctor said. He'd nearly forgotten about that. The crux of the Silurian empire, and it was not only the most cultured and beautiful center of arts but the most advanced military. "You would have got on well with the Romans," he muttered.

"The what?"

"Oh, never mind. Let's get on with this, then, shall we? Take me to your leader, boys!" The Doctor shot them all such a huge grin that he sent the Silurians into more of their sideways glances. He certainly had them confused, if nothing else. No ape would act this way.

"Right then," the leader said uncertainly. "We'll take this one back with us and send more of our people back for the blue box. We can't lift it with our small contingent."

The Doctor smiled patiently as the Silurians gathered around him, but when he looked over his shoulder, his smile changed to a frown. He spotted two faces peeking out of a crack in the TARDIS door—one ten-year-old face and one pretty one.

He put a finger up to his lips and motioned for Rose and Sammy to stay put. He would be back for them.

The TARDIS door closed again, and the Doctor sighed in relief. It was nice when his companions actually listened to him.


	21. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Three

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

Dean had seen a lot of things. He thought he'd seen it all.

He was wrong.

He took deep, rattling breaths and tried to fight against both the bile and the panic rising in his throat. Panic and selfishness wasn't allowed. He had to count on himself. He couldn't put Sammy in danger by delaying his escape and leaving him at the mercy of the lizard people. He couldn't count on the pansy Doctor who would rather talk and tinker and run than stand and fight and kill.

But he _hurt_.

Dean leaned back, his eyes closed, and tried to pretend he wasn't on the verge of crying. Crying was beneath him. Instead, he called out to the lizard outside the glass. "So what's the prognosis, Doc? Am I gonna live?"

The lizard doctor didn't answer.

"Hey! Scaly! I'm talking to you!"

That got his attention. The lizard doctor turned to him, tapping his pen—tap, tap, tap; he had been doing that this whole time and it still made Dean shudder—and tilted his head to one side. "Hmm. Interesting." He scribbled on his notebook some more—the guy must have taken notes on everything about Dean, both inside and out. "This ape has intelligence but still retains violent tendencies and employs a territorial aggression display when threatened."

"How many times I gotta tell you? I'm not an ape. My name's Dean."

The lizard man paused, stopped tapping his pencil, and pulled his chair up closer. "Dean," he repeated. "And who gave you that name?"

"My dad, you . . . ." He trailed off and shook his head. "It's like talking to a wall."

The lizard doctor laughed. "You haven't just been trained by some hunter. You have sarcasm, emotional range." He leaned in closer. "I wonder who sped up the process of your evolution. Perhaps we could adapt the technology ourselves for use against the Sea Devils."

But Dean wasn't really paying attention anymore. He was more concerned with what the lizard doctor mentioned earlier: "There are hunters around here?"

"Unfortunately," the lizard doctor frowned.

Dean frowned right back. Oh, so this doctor was just like Rose's doctor. Bigoted, self-righteous pricks, both of them. He could do without that condescension.

"I can see how you'd be a good tool for a hunter. The monsters seem to have taken a liking to you apes, and an intelligent prey like you would be perfect bait."

"I'm not an ape!" Dean would have punched him if he could have moved his arms. And he wasn't bait, either, but he didn't say that out loud.

"Not as we know them, no," the lizard doctor admitted. He leaned back and laughed. "Oh, but I've never talked to an ape before. I've had colleagues who have established some basic sign language communication, but they would die of jealousy if they were to stumble upon a scientific breakthrough like you."

"Hooray for them," Dean muttered, then winced as he growled too deep in his not-yet-fully-healed throat.

"But tell me," the lizard doctor said, unable to hide his glee even through the crystallized glass, "where did you learn our language?"

Not to be outdone, Dean shot back, "Where did you learn about hunters?"

"It's common knowledge," the lizard doctor shrugged. "Since you apes arrived, there have been hundreds of new monsters popping up everywhere. Of course the government would establish a branch to—"

"_Government subsidized _hunters?" Dean felt even sicker than had had when he'd seen his own gall bladder.

"There are, of course, some rogue elements," the lizard doctor said. "There were bound to be. Revenge is such a motivating factor in these things."

Dean fell silent.

"You may have encountered them, though the advanced science necessary to evolve you so far into the future suggests government funding."

Dean let the lizard doctor drone on and one. He wasn't interested anymore. He was a little too distracted by the thought of lizard hunters wearing government-issue suits and ties and holding _legitimate _badges that they didn't have to painstakingly slave over.

Whatever this messed up place was, he wanted out of it.

"Look, you're going to have to let me go sooner or later," Dean said, breaking into the long monotone the lizard doctor was giving about the virtues of having a government agency that could take care of the new threats while they focused on the problems at home about some things called Sea Devils who used to be foot soldiers but rose up in rebellion—which, frankly, Dean thought sounded like a hunter problem, Sea _Devils _and everything, but then again, there were lizard hunters, so . . . . "I've got some pretty powerful friends—"

"That's exactly what we're counting on, isn't it?" the lizard doctor broke in. "Someone had to put a lot of effort into you, and that someone is going to want you back."

Realization sank in. Dean leaned back with a loud, prolonged groan. "You have _got _to be kidding me." He _hated _being the bait.

The lizard doctor went back to his notes and his muttering and the pencil tap, tap, tapping. Dean closed his eyes and leaned back and tried to will his body into feeling better so he could get out of this place. No such luck.

Luckily—or maybe unluckily, depending on how you looked at it—Dean didn't have to wait very long for the excitement to kick in. A bunch of other lizards burst into the room, and through the crystallized glass, Dean could see that they'd brought someone with them. Too tall to be Sammy, not blonde enough to be Rose.

"Doc, what did you do?" Dean groaned to himself. Then, straightening up, he shouted, "You call this a rescue mission?"

Dean couldn't quite hear what the Doctor said in response—he was too far away from the glass. The Doctor and the lizard doctor were talking animatedly about something—figures the two of them would be all buddy-buddy being doctors and everything. The Doc probably thought this whole thing was a fun adventure.

Dean hadn't really thought the Doctor was religious, what with his not believing in anything supernatural and everything, but he saw the Doctor make some kind of sign. He pointed to his heart and then to the other side of his chest. He kept doing that while the lizard doctor just kind of stood there staring at him.

Dean couldn't hear the conversation, but he knew the Doctor was getting frustrated when he threw up his hands and ran them through his ridiculous hair.

Things weren't going well; Dean could tell. And it wouldn't hurt to hum "Seek and Destroy" while he waited—it calmed him down. Except when he sang the lyrics in his head about dying a thousand deaths his head hurt even worse than before.

Dean groaned, then decided he'd had enough of watching the two doctors argue with each other. He was just about to shout for attention when he felt something rumbling.

Both the doctors—the human one and the lizard one—grabbed the nearest table to steady themselves. Dean's Doctor said something to the lizard guy with his face really close to his ear, and the lizard doctor motioned for the other lizards to back off.

In three long strides, the Doctor was in front of Dean's little pod. He pulled out his sonic thingamawhatsit and undid the lock, grinning like an idiot. "Hey, Dean. I see you've met the Silurians."

"We don't seem to get along very well," Dean shot right back. "You gonna get me outta this, Doc?"

"Don't call me—"

Dean rolled his eyes. "Just do your magic sonic thing."

The Doctor pressed his lips together in a frown and was about to use the sonic thing on the straps still holding Dean in when the rumbling started again. This time, it was much closer—and much more disruptive. The whole ground shook, things started tumbling off of shelves, and the Doctor listed sideways.

"Umm, Doc?" Dean tried to pretend he wasn't nervous, but since he couldn't move and the lizards had all pulled out their guns, it was hard not to be.

The Doctor turned to see the lizard soldiers on alert and frowned. "Ah," he said simply before he turned back to Dean to let him out of the little pod.

Dean hadn't realized that the straps were holding him in place until he embarrassed himself by collapsing under the weight of his own body. He pushed off the Doctor's attempts to help him to his feet with a grunt, then forced his knees straight and grabbed the nearest table for support.

"The anesthesia hasn't quite worn off," the lizard doctor explained when the Doctor glared at him accusingly.

"I'm fine," Dean assured the Doctor—since the doc looked like he was about to do something ridiculous like try to wrap his arm under Dean's shoulders and hold him up.

"No, you're not," the Doctor said. Something dangerous flashed behind his eyes as he glanced over at the lizard doctor, and to Dean's surprise, the lizard doctor seemed cowed by that something.

Huh. Maybe there was something to this strange doctor after all.

"Well, I will be," Dean said. He straightened his shoulders for good measure, and even though he was still wobbly, the Doctor seemed to accept that—for now.

Of course, that probably had something to do with the fact that the rumbling was getting stronger, and Dean could finally recognize the sound for what it was: footsteps.

Dean grimaced. "Sounds big," he said. "What do you think it is? Demons? Poltergeist?"

"Myrka," one of the lizards said. (Dean recognized him as one of the lizards who brought him here in the first place. Oh, _now _he was worth talking to!) "It was only a matter of time before they started turning our own creations against us."

"Myrka?" Dean repeated, wrinkling his nose. That definitely sounded made up.

But the Doctor didn't seem to think it was made up. In fact, Dean could see the Doctor tensing even more than the usual grabbing-things-to-keep-from-falling kind of tensing everyone else was doing. Dean recognized the symptoms: The Doctor had seen a Myrka before.

"Okay, Doc," Dean said slowly, "how screwed are we?"

The Doctor didn't say anything, but his frown spoke volumes.

...

**A/N: **For those of you who haven't seen Classic Who, the Myrka is one of my favorite horribly-costumed monsters. In my head, he's been redesigned for New Who in this story, but you're welcome to watch the episode "Warriors of the Deep" for reference. Because Five is in it and he's my favorite Classic Doctor, and because let's be honest, half the fun of Classic Who is the monsters where you can see the people underneath the costumes.


	22. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Four

A/N: Lest anyone object, I'm taking a few liberties with my Silurians in this universe while still being true to canon as much as possible. In canon, the Sea Devils were foot soldiers, sort of secondary citizens in the Silurian empire. At the same time, the Silurian empire at its crux was described by the Doctor as incredibly advanced, peaceful, and civilized. In the Silurian timeline, the empire hasn't quite reached the peaceful, advanced civilization the Doctor was describing, but it is on its way there. Imagine pre-World War Europe.

Seriously, I put a lot of thought into things like this.

Anyway, it's the week before finals, so that means procrastination! (I mean chapters!)

Disclaimer; I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

And things had been going so well!

The Doctor sighed and set his shoulders. This always happened. He'd finally managed to convince the Silurian doctor that he was _not _a human (after a quick scan to confirm that he had two hearts, since apparently these Silurians were incapable of taking him at his word), and he'd even managed to negotiate Dean's release once he had convinced them that he was a Time Lord and they shouldn't be messing with the laws of time (he may have lied just the tiniest bit about what kind of power he could wield as a Time Lord to do so . . . .)

But of course it would be his luck to land in the middle of the great Sea Devil Uprising. The TARDIS couldn't resist all that excitement, and under normal circumstances, neither could he.

But he had a teenager and a little kid in tow. Now was not the time for adventure, not with a trigger-happy hunter and his over-worried brother.

"Okay," Dean said slowly, straightening up to try and hide the fact that his knees were wobbly (it wasn't working), "how do we fight this thing?"

"We don't," the Doctor said quickly. "At least not you and me. We can't interfere here."

"What, so we just stand by and let it kill us because of your weird rules?" Dean scrunched up his nose to show his annoyance. "I don't think so, Doc."

"Don't call me—"

Dean waved him off and turned to the Silurian doctor. If the Doctor hadn't known that Dean had only ten seconds previously been the doctor's prisoner, he would have thought they were old soldier buddies the way Dean talked. "You got any decent ammo to fight this thing or are we stranded with no-help medical kits?"

The Silurian doctor blinked at Dean, probably surprised to find himself suddenly on equal footing with an ape. "Of course we are equipped for emergencies—"

"Show me." Dean rushed off with the Silurian doctor without a second glance, and with only a barely noticeable limp in his step. Like nothing had happened. A perfect little soldier.

It might be too late for the Doctor to get him back from that.

"And you're quite sure he hasn't been trained by hunters?"

"Oh, he's been trained by a hunter, alright," the Doctor said darkly, glaring after his companion. "But not one of yours."

"An ape hunter?" the nearest Silurian said. "Your time must be very different from our own."

"Oh, you'd be surprised," the Doctor said. "Just you wait a few more millennia when you and the apes coexist peacefully on the same planet."

The same Silurian snorted. "I highly doubt that."

The Doctor raised one eyebrow but didn't say anything. There were still millennia left in which the Silurians and humans would be fighting for control of the planet. He didn't want to start anything too early, especially when the Silurians hadn't even gone into hiding.

_Crash. _

"Ah. That must be the outer wall of your defenses, am I right?" the Doctor said. He was racking his mind for anything he could use for reference. He'd only faced a Myrka a few times, and he hadn't seen the Silurians much in their natural habitat—too tame for the TARDIS, apparently. What battle was this? Where were they in Silurian history? His head was getting too full, too old. Centuries of knowledge crammed in there, not to mention all the pop culture he'd accidentally absorbed from his time on Earth.

"The Sea Devils," the Silurian said.

"Hang on," the Doctor said. "We're in the middle of a desert."

"Not quite the middle," the Silurian smiled. "The shore's just a few miles away."

The Doctor laughed. "We must have walked the wrong way."

_Crash._

"They can't get in here," the Silurian nearest him said. "It's impenetrable."

The Doctor winced. "Ooh, I don't like that word. Sounds like 'unsinkable.'"

"What's wrong with that?"

"After your time."

The Silurian frowned again. "I've never much cared for mysteries."

"Me neither," the Doctor agreed conspiratorially. "Always wanted to know what made things tick." He frowned. "Seemed to get me in trouble a lot, mind you. My schoolteachers were always telling me to observe and never to dig."

"Sounds boring."

"That's what I said!" the Doctor agreed. He threw his hands up in the air to show his enthusiasm, but just then, the Myrka pushed through a little further. More rumbles sent the Doctor sprawling, and the Silurian laughed.

"Not much of a soldier, I take it?" the Silurian asked.

"I tried it once. Didn't agree with me," the Doctor said, trying to keep his tone light, but the wounds were still fresh. It was one thing to talk about the War with Rose, but with strangers . . . .

"Of course. A man of learning like yourself would naturally be unsuited for weaponry," the Silurian said, but the Doctor could see the slight smile playing at the corners of his mouth.

"Sorry, I don't think we've been properly introduced. I'm the Doctor," he said, sticking his hand out.

The Silurian offered his own and opened his mouth to say something, but the explosion cut him off.

When the dust and the rubble settled, the Doctor shook himself off and picked some of the bigger pieces out of his hair. He glanced around to see that the other Silurians were still standing before he turned back toward the corridor Dean had disappeared into.

It had collapsed.

….

"He shouldn't have made us wait," Sammy said.

Rose sighed and peeked outside the door again. The green lizard people were gathering in greater numbers around the TARDIS, and she didn't like the look of it. "The Doctor knows what he's doing."

"So you're just going to let him order you around?" Sammy frowned. "You're just like Dean."

"Thanks," Rose said absently. "But I'm not Dean. For one thing, I'm no soldier. And for another?" She paused to point at the TARDIS scanner. "We're sneaking into enemy camp. We're not just standing by."

Sammy followed her gaze and smiled at the scanner as he watched the lizard people taking their positions around the TARDIS. "Trojan horse?"

"Exactly," Rose grinned.

Of course, it was a lot harder to be proud of her plan when the lizard people actually picked up the TARDIS and made everything tip over.

Sammy tumbled into her headfirst and knocked her into the door—it was a good thing the TARDIS was built to last. He groaned as the TARDIS tilted the other way, but Rose grabbed one of the handrails to keep from listing with him. Sammy, on the other hand, hit the console—hard.

"You okay?" Rose called out. When the TARDIS stopped tilting too far and went back to just bobbing the slightest bit to the rhythm of footsteps, she let go of her handhold and crossed the TARDIS to check on little Sammy.

"I'm fine. Don't treat me like a baby," Sammy said before she could even get to him. He pushed her away with a frown so much like his big brother than she would have laughed if the circumstances were difference.

"I just wanted to be sure my backup wasn't out of commission," Rose said. She'd dealt with this before, with Dean. She couldn't be concerned for him, only concerned for herself. She had to couch her worries that way or they would ignore her.

"I'll be fine. You okay?"

"I've seen worse." She grinned at him.

"I thought this thing was supposed to be sophisticated. How come it's so bumpy?"

Rose started to say something about how the TARDIS was still subject to the laws of nature, even if it was a little more advanced, but something stopped her. She looked at Sammy and saw the way he glanced at the scanner, the way he was still barely holding back his earlier panic at losing his brother, the way his eyes were bright and fierce. So she decided the best thing to do was make him laugh. "We would advise all passengers to please fasten their seatbelts, as some turbulence may arise."

Sammy frowned at her, but he could only hold in his smile for so long before it leaked out one corner of his mouth.

"Besides," Rose said, "you should see what it's like when the Doctor's driving. I'm still not sure he actually got his license."

Another smile.

Rose went on like that for a while, telling stories about how ridiculous the Doctor could be, about how he would insult lower species when he was annoyed or angry, about how he would spout off maddeningly ridiculous scientific facts and expect everyone to keep up. She even got Sammy to laugh out loud at one point.

And then something exploded.

Rose went sprawling, but she was close enough to Sammy that she was able to grab hold of him and tuck him under her arm. She felt her head hit the back of the TARDIS console, but she didn't black out, thankfully.

Sammy scrambled to his feet and offered her a hand up, which she grudgingly took. It took a moment for her vision to adjust, but when it did, she realized something was off with the TARDIS. She was standing upright, but she almost hit her head on the pillar in the center of the TARDIS console.

They were sideways.

"I'm standing in something wet," Sammy said from the other side of the console.

Rose pulled herself up and around to find Sammy sitting on the pillar, swinging his legs over the edge, and looking at his shoes in dismay. They were covered in something white and sticky.

"And there goes the milk," Rose sighed. They really needed to find a new place for the fridge, but it was convenient to have it so near the main doors so they could snack while they hung their legs out of the TARDIS and watched planets pass below them.

"What happened?" Sammy asked. "Can you see the viewer thingy from there?"

Rose pulled herself up and around once more until she found the scanner to pull it towards her. She just barely contained her gasp of surprise when she saw the great big face peering back at her—or back at the TARDIS, of course.

This thing wasn't like the lizard people. It looked sort of like them—a little bit—but it was wet, more like a fish. Were those gills?

"Rose?" Sammy called out. Now that she couldn't see him and he didn't have to put up a strong front, Rose could hear his voice warbling just the slightest bit as he started to panic.

"I think our Trojan horse just got hijacked," Rose said.

"By who?"

"No idea."


	23. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Five

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural, nor do I own any of the related rights.

...

The TARDIS was actually kind of fun when it was sideways and shaky. Kinda like a jungle gym.

Sam jumped down from the main pillar onto the yellow seats and smiled down at Rose reassuringly. "Don't worry," he said. "Dean's gonna find us, even if we can't find him."

It had taken him way too long to remember that about his brother—that Dean was most definitely always going to come after him. Sammy was never in trouble too long because Dean always got there in time. It didn't matter where Dean was so long as he was alive.

And Dean was definitely alive, and the fish people looked dangerous, so it was only a matter of time before Dean came rushing to the rescue, right?

Rose blinked up at Sam. She looked surprised that Sam could be so sure. But Rose didn't know Dean like Sam did, didn't know what big brother were capable of.

The TARDIS tilted to one side again, and Sam grabbed hold of Rose's hand to make sure she wasn't going to fall over. He wanted to make sure she was safe after she had taken such good care of him. She smiled at him and held his hand right back. (She was probably glad to have a hunter around to help.)

"I'm sure the Doctor found Dean," Rose said. "I just hope he can find the TARDIS again after it's been moved."

Sam tilted his head at Rose and studied her. She talked about the Doctor with the same faith that Sam had in Dean. That kind of trust was hard to come by outside of family, and Sam couldn't help but wonder if he would find a friend like that one day, someone who trusted _him _to be the hero for once.

The TARDIS tilted again, and Rose reached for his hand. Rose trusted him to be there when she reached, and Sam was glad to find someone who looked _to _him and not _after _him.

"Are you okay?" Sam asked quietly. He had never had someone to look after, not even when Dean was sick because Dean always tried to take care of himself. But he knew the basics from Dean. Ask them how they were, offer hands and shoulders for support. Sam could totally do this.

Sam didn't really understand why Rose was smiling so big when she said, "Thank you for looking after me, Sammy."

"Dean says that's what hunters are supposed to do."

Rose laughed again, and when she did, Sam felt like laughing, too. When she stopped laughing, she smiled and said, "Maybe you should tell that to the Doctor."

"Doesn't he already know?" Sam asked. "I thought the Doctor knew about hunters."

Rose laughed again.

Sam was confused. How could the Doctor know about hunters and not know about what it was that they did? What did the Doctor see that Dean wasn't telling him? (Sam wouldn't put it past Dean to tell Sam only the good parts.) Maybe he should look into this . . . .

Rose smiled and started to say something else, but the TARDIS tilted again, and she reached out for Sam's hand. While Sam held her tightly, she frowned at the floor of the TARDIS—which was now the right way up.

"What's wrong?" Sam asked. He didn't like when Rose frowned. It made him nervous.

"I think we've stopped," she said simply.

…

Dean swore at the huge pile of rocks blocking his way. "Doc?" he shouted. "Hey, Doc!"

No answer.

Dean swore again, turned on his heels, saw the lizard doctor, and swore some more. The stupid lizard was trapped from about chest-level down in rubble—and all their weapons were buried with him.

Dean frowned and climbed over the rocks. "You okay?" he called out as he went. If the lizard was dead, Dean was lost in the underground maze.

The lizard doctor groaned.

Dean grinned and knelt down to start shifting rocks. "Man, I thought I lost my guide."

"And your defenses," the lizard said with a smirk.

"Yeah, that too." Dean grunted as he tried to shift some of the rubble, but it was pretty solid. "Can you move at all?"

Grunts and groans, then, "No. Sorry."

"Awesome." Dean sighed and leaned back against the wall. "This is gonna take a while."

_Crash_.

The lizard doctor's head jerked up. "We may not have much time. The Sea Devils are breaking through."

"What are they, anyway?" Dean asked. What he meant to ask was, "How do we kill them?" But the lizard doctor probably would have just launched into another tirade about how he had been trained so violently, and they so didn't have time for that.

"Foot soldiers. Workers," the lizard doctor said in a voice filled with disgust. "They have always been content to serve, and now they want to challenge the status quo."

Dean couldn't help but laugh. "Lizard-Fish Civil Rights Movement," he chuckled, shaking his head. "Of course. The Doc sure knows how to pick a vacation spot."

_Crash. _

Dean steadied himself against the wall. "You got a way out of here?"

"Nothing that hasn't already collapsed," the lizard said, then coughed some more as he inhaled the displaced dust.

Dean swore under his breath.

_Crash._

"Oh, come on!" Dean shouted at the wall as it splintered. Through the cracks, Dean could see the sparkle of sunlight and could smell fish—dried up fish.

_Crash._

The wall splintered even more, and Dean saw the business end of some kind of weapon. He dropped flat and felt the heat of the discharge graze his back. "Hey!" he shouted, annoyed.

With one last crash, the wall came tumbling down, and Dean scrambled out of the way, holding up his hands to show that he was unarmed as at least a hundred fish people rushed into the room. They mostly ignored the trapped lizard—who was excellent at playing dead—and instead focused on the final wall between them and the other lizards.

Dean wasn't sure whether to be relieved or offended that the fish people were ignoring him, but he knew an opportunity when he saw one. He tried to inch his way toward the opening—only to be stopped by something huge.

"You must be the Myrka," Dean said with a weak smile and a nervous chuckle.

It was easy to see why the Doctor and the lizard people were so nervous about this thing. It was at least as long as three grown men and twice as tall as Dean. It looked almost like a dinosaur, with its thick skin and long neck—but it smelled like fish and had huge, frilly gills. When it saw Dean standing in its way in the doorway, it growled so low that even Dean felt his throat go dry. This was definitely not like anything he had ever hunted before.

When the Myrka growled at him, the fish people decided Dean was worth noticing. The nearest fish soldier jerked him out of the way so the Myrka could waddle into the wall and continue its rampage. That same fish soldier continued to hold Dean by the back of his collar and whirled him around to face him. "And what are you supposed to be?" he asked, sneering in Dean's face. "More genetic experimenting? A poor copy of an ape?" When these fish thing spoke, it was like listening to everything underwater and through a hissing soundtrack. Everything came out a little bit staccato, a little jumbled, like he was breathing through his gills at the same time he was talking. Kinda weird, but Dean had seen weirder.

Dean glared right back. "You're one to talk, ugly. Now lemme go or I'll take your head off."

The nice thing about being mistaken for a caveman was the uninhibited surprise Dean got to see when he actually had a conversation with them. The fish soldier holding his collar was so surprised that he let go of Dean and took a step back. "What kind of ape is _that_?"

"Probably somebody's pet. Put it down," said the fish with the most elaborate uniform—obviously the leader.

The fish soldiers around him raised their guns, and Dean took a step back and held up his hands. "Whoa, whoa, whoa. Wait, wait—just wait," he said, stumbling over his words. "Let's think about this, huh? I'm not a lizard. I'm not a fish. I really don't want any part of this. Why not just let me go, huh?" He flashed them his best smile, the one he usually reserved for hot chicks.

The fish soldiers paused just long enough for the last of the contingent to arrive—carrying a familiar blue box.

Dean's eyes widened, and the fish leader must have recognized the look of understanding, because he grabbed Dean by the scruff of the neck and shoved Dean's face right up to the TARDIS door. "Are you familiar with this weapon technology, ape?"

"See, I've been telling the lizards, and now I'm telling you: I'm not an ape!" Dean knew he couldn't tell them about the TARDIS right off; it was his one and only bargaining chip. So he figured he would just keep doing the belligerent thing and keep them on their toes until he could figure out how to get out of this.

But the fish people weren't in the mood for games. The leader nodded to a soldier, who placed a fist in Dean's stomach. As Dean groaned, the leader said, "Answer the question, ape. We don't have time to confront the Silurians without understanding their latest technology. We can't lose men over this."

Dean threw back his head and laughed. "Is that what this is all about? You morons!"

Apparently, the fish soldiers didn't take very well to being called names. The leader threw him to the ground, and another fish moved to kick him. Dean closed his eyes and waited, wincing and tensing so the blow would hurt the least when it fell.

Suddenly, a little ball of rage tumbled out of the TARDIS doors, punching and kicking and biting and screaming, "You leave my big brother alone!"


	24. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Six

A/N: After waking up at 5:30 am to study for a 7am final, I came home and didn't have enough time for a nap, so I decided to finish this chapter and put it up instead. Now off to work! *makes superhero cape noises*

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

"Dean!"

The Doctor could hardly believe his rotten luck. He'd only got Dean back for a few seconds before he lost him again! This boy gave entirely new meaning to his usual standards of "danger-prone" companions.

"It's really no use shouting," his new Silurian friend said. "Your friend is lost to you—whether buried in the rockslide or killed by the Myrka and its Sea Devil companions, we cannot tell."

_Crash._

"Well," the Silurian hedged, "it may possibly be more likely the Myrka has ended your friend's existence. It seems to be very close to ending our defenses."

The Doctor shook his head and muttered, "This isn't good. I do _not _want to be caught in the middle of this."

The Silurian patted him on the back. "There's no need to be so concerned. We'll get through this. The Sea Devils have yet to find a weakness in our defenses, and our warriors are more than a match for them." He grinned. "We also have a strict policy about civilians."

The Doctor shook his head and even managed a small grin, but the Silurian beside him didn't understand just how much trouble they were in. The Doctor was pretty sure he knew exactly when and where they had landed—his TARDIS was a bit unpredictable, but she liked to make sure he hit all the highlights of history, whether or not he was supposed to be there to interfere—and he had to get everyone out of there as soon as possible.

"Doctor?"

The Doctor turned to see the Silurians looking curiously at him. He hadn't realized that he had looked so distressed, but it must have been obvious to them. "I'm fine," he said quickly. "I really just need to find my friend and get out of here. We don't belong in this time, and I don't want to interfere with events any more than I already have."

But his new friend had already caught on, and he took a step closer, his tongue flickering just behind his teeth with concern. "What is it you know?"

"Tell me your name," the Doctor countered.

"What does that matter?"

"It matters a lot."

The Silurian frowned but said, "Yvash."

"Prince of the People?"

Yvash nodded.

"Defender of the Great City of Grihsk?"

Yvash nodded again, this time a bit sheepishly.

The Doctor shook his head. "I know your history, Yvash. I know this battle. And it's a huge turning point in your history. I can't be here. Dean can't be here. We have to get out of here before we upset a delicate balance."

As the Doctor turned to leave, Yvash grabbed his arm to keep him there. "Wait," Yvash said. "Doctor, please. You can't tell us that the fate of history rests on our shoulders and then abandon us."

"That's exactly what I'm trying to do, actually," the Doctor said. He tried to play it off with a hint of a smile, but it didn't work.

"You may not wish to interfere, but we can't let you go breaching our borders if the battle is so important," Yvash said. As the Doctor watched, Yvash's entire bearing changed. Suddenly, he was tall, regal, more demanding, more like a soldier. He was getting ready for war.

And so it begins.

The Doctor sighed as the Silurians continued to push him behind their lines. Whenever he tried to break free, they would just grip him more insistently and push him even harder.

_Crash._

The Doctor could hear the Myrka's deep-throated growl, but above that, he could also hear something else. Yelling, confused shouting. And something higher-pitched.

"You leave my big brother alone!"

The Doctor almost groaned out loud. There was Sammy. There was no telling where the youngest Winchester had been all that time, but if his big brother was in trouble, and if he was anything like Dean, the Sea Devils were in trouble.

Hadn't he just been talking about not interfering with the course of history? Sammy was going to single-handedly take down the Sea Devil fleet if they'd hurt Dean.

But the Doctor remembered this battle in history. He remembered the Sea Devil victory, the hostage Yvash, the months of heated negotiations, the noble prince who befriended his captors and became the greatest advocate for equal rights in the empire. These people would shape the Silurian empire until it became the great, prosperous, advances society sleeping under the Earth for so long, the people who thought life was sacred and were so proud of the lives they built. The Sea Devils had to win this fight for the Silurians to win their future.

"Another friend of yours?" Yvash asked with a teasing grin.

"Dean's little brother," the Doctor said. "They almost never go anywhere without each other, unless one of them has been kidnapped by a strange race they've never met before." He added that last part with a particular nod to Yvash's men, just to remind them that they weren't supposed to be here.

But after some initial shrieks and mumbles and groans, the Doctor could not hear Sammy's voice anymore.

"Sammy?"

_Crash._

The Myrka broke through at last, and the Doctor lost track of Yvash and the other Silurians in the chaos that followed. He dropped to his hands and knees, out of the Myrka's sight, and ducked behind the nearest medical table to see if he could spot Dean and Sammy.

He spotted Dean first. One of the Sea Devils had a fistful of his hair and was dragging him along behind, and Dean was shouting a list of obscenities that the Doctor wished the TARDIS wouldn't translate into Gallifreyan. They were bad enough in English, but the comparable translations . . . .

The Doctor waited until Dean was close before he whispered, "Dean, are you okay?"

"Doc, when I get out of this, I'm gonna kill you," Dean muttered. "Worst vacation of all time."

The Doctor grinned. "You're fine." The Sea Devil who had Dean by the hair was still marching forward, so the Doctor crept alongside them behind medical equipment, fallen soldier, whatever he could find in the chaos. "Where's your brother?"

"He'll be fine. Rose has him."

"Rose . . . .?" The Doctor shook his head. He should have known. "Where are they?"

"Back in the tunnels by the TARDIS surrounded by a bunch of those fish-people guards," Dean muttered.

The Sea Devil tugged on his hair to turn him around and whirled him around to face him. "Who are you talking to?"

"Just saying a few prayers over the dead," Dean said without hesitation. Lying came so naturally to him that the Doctor wasn't sure whether to be impressed or upset. It certainly came in handy at times like this.

The Sea Devil glared at him, but Dean was so confident, so straight-backed as he stared right back into the Sea Devil's eyes, that he had no choice but to believe his captive. "Fine," he muttered before he went back to dragging the poor hunter through the battlefield.

"If Rose and Sammy are back at the TARDIS, what are you doing here?"

"They think I'm the royal pet," Dean snorted. He tripped when the Sea Devil let go of his hair and motioned for him to sit in the nearest corner while the Sea Devil finally got tired of guard duty and chose to join in the massacre.

When the Doctor finally peeked out from around his table, he wished he hadn't. He'd known what he would see, of course. He knew none of the Silurians would survive this. But knowing something intellectually and seeing it up close . . . .

"Doc, you okay?" Dean asked.

The Doctor took a deep breath and shook his head, then scooted as close as he could to Dean's corner. "What happened? Is Rose okay?"

Dean laughed. "Figures."

"What?"

"Nothing." But Dean was grinning all the same. "She saved both our skins, actually. Pretty sure the fish people were gonna kill us for getting in their way, and then Rose came out of the TARDIS giving orders like she was some kind of queen. Called herself the Wolf Princess or something like that. Said we were royalty among our kind and that they'd have a new war on their hands if they hurt the young princes."

"And they believed her?"

"It helped that she had a crown," Dean said with a lopsided grin. "Seriously, Doc, what all have you got in that box of yours?"

"Odds and ends," the Doctor shrugged. He wasn't really sure himself. He heard the _thud _of a body nearby and retreated into his hiding place with a grimace, waited for a few minutes, and then poked his head out again. "And they brought you along as, what, security?"

"I think they think we've got an alliance with the Silurians."

"Of course." The Doctor blew his breath out. He hated it when he got sucked into war zones like this. Not so much as a "by your leave" and they were assigning blame and sides in the conflict before the Doctor could say a thing.

When this was all over, though, he'd have to congratulate Rose on her quick thinking. Tell her how proud he was. She really could handle herself on her own. And that worried him, thinking about how she didn't need him anymore, not like he needed her. And if one day she decided that traveling with him wasn't the same, if she decided it was time to leave . . . .

Well, that was why he hadn't told her everything, hadn't opened himself up to her leaving because he scared her away.

The Doctor was so lost in his thoughts that he didn't notice the Sea Devils overturning tables until it was too late—and then he was completely exposed, a lone Time Lord sitting in the middle of battle.

Without the protection of the table, he had a full view of the battle. He could see everything Dean had watched—at least the aftermath of it—and he suddenly couldn't help wondering what Dean had seen that this kind of thing didn't bother him. It was gruesome, it was war, and it was enough to make even the Doctor feel a bit queasy.

And there, in the middle of it all, was Yvash, surrounded by warriors, still fighting even as the Sea Devils had a rope around his wrists (it was still early in the Silurians' evolutionary cycle, so they didn't yet have to worry about Yvash's tongue; it was only deadly to soft-fleshed prey).

The nearest Sea Devil jerked the Doctor to his feet and clicked his tongue in annoyance. "They seem to be multiplying like Tyrs fleas."

As Yvash shot the Doctor a sympathetic look, the Doctor couldn't help rolling his eyes at Dean's impish grin and whispered, "Welcome to the party, Doc."


	25. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Seven

A/N: Moving and graduation last weekend, and then I collapsed from exhaustion and holed up in my house with my laptop because I literally don't have anything more to give to being social with people. Therefore, writing. Writing always helps.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

Dean knew he'd never hear the end of it from Sammy if he threw up, so he didn't.

Besides, he looked really cool in front of the Doctor, all stoic in the face of war and slaughter and completely unaffected. He was a rock, absolutely unshakable.

Yeah right. He was gonna hurl.

The thing that bothered him wasn't really all the blood or the gore or anything like that. He'd seen vampire nests and decapitations. That wasn't anything new. It was the smell. The smell of fish and lizard . . . well, yeah. It was gross.

"You hurt him and you're in trouble," Dean said as the nearest fish creature thing dragged the Doctor to his feet.

"And why's that?"

"He's the queen's mate," he said.

The Doctor looked like he wasn't sure whether to tell Dean off or go with the plan to save his own neck. His entire face flushed bright red, and _oh yeah _Dean was definitely enjoying this. Check and _mate_, Doc.

Dean grinned to himself at his own pun before he realized he was getting just as cheesy as the Doctor. He'd have to put a stop to that sooner or later.

Maybe later.

"Just leave him with this one. We can't spare anyone else to take him back."

"Why leave them alive anyway?"

Dean had been wondering the same thing, but he wasn't going to ask it out loud. He was plenty fine if they got left alive, actually, and he wasn't about to go pressing his luck. He knew better than that.

"You think these mutated apes weren't here for a reason?" the fish leader shot back. He had just about finished tying down one of the lizard people who captured Dean (Silo-somethings, the Doctor had called them, but he couldn't remember the word) and turned around to see what his soldiers were complaining about. "I've never seen anything like them before, and then we find an entire nest?"

"I don't like them."

Dean grinned. "The feeling's mutual."

"You're not helping," the Doctor said.

Dean just grinned again.

But the fish people weren't very easily distracted, and it was clear that they had come for one purpose: they were determined to kill all the lizards except for the one in front of the leader. And they looked pretty pleased about it—if pleased was the word Dean wanted to use for the expression their gills sorta kinda made if he looked at them the right way. Their faces were all . . . wonky. Not human.

Dean wanted to go home, back to where at least the monsters had names and a list of weapons that could kill them.

The Doctor was shoved unceremoniously next to Dean, and Dean just grinned at his friend's annoyed expression. "Long time no see," he said.

"This is very bad, Dean. We need to get out of here before we get ourselves even more deeply involved in the rich history of this culture."

"You've lost me. There's lizards, there's fish, and there's some kind of Martin Luther King March on Washington stuff going down, but I'm not seeing . . . ." He trailed off at the look on the Doctor's face. "Okay. You've obviously peeked at the ending of this particular history book. Got any good secrets to tell?"

"Only regrets," the Doctor shot back. "I can't believe I brought a hunter into this mess."

"Can the classism, Doc. You're almost as bad as your alien counterpart."

"You know they're not aliens, don't you?"

"Lizard face, fish gills, dissection and probing? I dunno what movie you're watching, but these things definitely fit the bill."

"They'd have to be from a different planet to be aliens," the Doctor pointed out.

"Anything non-human on earth is something I hunt," Dean said, "and I've never seen anything like this, not in any journals or records or even fairy tales. So tell me they're not aliens. I dare you."

"They're not aliens."

Dean rolled his eyes. "Shouldn't've dared you."

"They're Silurians," the Doctor continued with that same, tired, patient, way-too-fatherly-for-Dean's-tastes voice he'd been using since he found out Dean was a hunter. "They were here on Earth before humanity had even climbed down out of the trees, and they lived beside humanity for millennia after they emerged from their underground holes in your own not-too-distant future."

Dean blew out his breath. "So they're like talking dinosaurs?"

The Doctor just rolled his eyes. "What did you tell them that they thought bringing you along in the middle of battle was a good idea?"

"Rose asked if I knew where you were, but I guess they thought she was talking about the lizard doc, because next thing I know, I'm being dragged around as the _royal pet _or something. It was hard to tell with all the hissing."

But now the Doctor was distracted, too busy listening to the Silurian prisoner and the Silurian . . . fish . . . thing yell back and forth at each other about how neither side was ever going to surrender.

Must be some important lizards to make the Doctor ignore Dean like that.

The Doctor looked tense, though, so Dean decided it was a good idea to shut up and listen.

"You have no other choice but to surrender. There is no need for further violence. Aren't your people the ones always talking about a peaceful solution? You're only hurting your cause by refusing to stick to your morals."

"Don't throw my words back in my face. This is a kidnapping, and I won't give it any credibility by submitting to it as if it were nothing more than a minor inconvenience. This is no protest, no nonviolence march. This is terrorism."

"Don't throw that word around—"

"Don't patronize me."

Dean smirked. He could almost hear Bobby jumping in at this point. "Sam, stop trying to one-up your brother. And Dean, don't rise to his bait! Like two sibling arguing, but instead it was two sister races fighting for centuries."

Dean blinked. He hadn't ever done that before, seen the way the Doctor must have thought about history. To him, a couple centuries was hardly worth batting an eye. This single moment in time was an adventure, but it was just one in many, a point in a line made up of far too many to count.

Dean felt very small, and he hadn't realized he was tucking his knees up under his chin until he felt his hands wrap around them.

"Perhaps you require only a little more motivation," the fish leader said.

Dean could see where this was going. Crap.

"What more can you possibly do?"

"Oh, please don't ask that out loud, you idiot," Dean whispered through clenched teeth. (He caught the Doctor grinning at that one.)

The fish leader person snapped his fingers, and Dean braced himself, waiting for the inevitable danger. This was why they'd left him alive—it had to be.

Only there was no clammy hand on his shoulder, no webbed fingers grabbing his hair. There was only the dull clang as someone pushed a door open.

Everyone turned; there was really nothing else for it. They all turned to the sound, and the only surprise left was the fact that the Doctor jumped to his feet faster than Dean did.

"Don't you hurt her," the Doctor said.

At the same time, Dean shouted, "You hurt my brother and I'll kill you."

The Silurian looked confused as the full wrath of both Dean and the Doctor turned on him. Dean could see the guy's eyes widening, and he might have felt bad and maybe toned it back long enough to explain, but there really wasn't time.

"Just think. Visiting dignitaries killed under your watch. Alliances are no longer safe. You can't protect your own," the fish guy was saying.

Dean temporarily forgot that there was someone standing nearby with a gun. He forgot, that is, until there was suddenly a gun in the small of his back and a hand on his shoulder holding him back.

And Dean grinned.

"You know," he said slowly, "you shouldn't ever put the gun right up to where it touches my back." He tensed and relaxed his muscles. He'd seen this trick done a thousand times, and he'd practiced it in the mirror. But this was real life.

Here goes nothing.

He spun around, quick as thought, and grabbed the barrel of the gun. With his elbow, he jabbed the fish thing in the nose (well, what he hoped was the nose) and then spun so that he jerked the gun completely out of its hands.

"Something to learn from," he said. He was sure glad that worked.

The Doctor vaulted the nearest table in the confusion and headed right for Rose. He was a good runner, good at defense and at dodging and weaving as webbed hands reached out to try and stop him, but it wasn't until about six of them ganged up on the Doctor that they stopped him from getting to Rose.

Dean frowned. He still had a gun, but he was definitely outnumbered, even with his back against the nearest desk so no one could get the jump on him from behind. He turned to look at Sammy and gave him a playful wink, just to show he was in control.

He wasn't, of course, but Sammy had to think that.

"Enough!" the important lizard captive shouted at last, and it was loud enough and surprising enough to get everyone's attention. The fish who had weapons trained on Dean, the leader who had previously been gloating, the ones pinning down Rose and the Doctor and Sammy. The lizard grinned triumphantly when he saw that he had everyone's attention, then said, "You have no idea the power you are dealing with. These are not just visiting emissaries. They are dignitaries from another time, another place. Harm them and you risk the future as well as the present."

"And yet if we lose the war, we have no present or future," the fish thing countered.

Something changed behind the lizard's eyes, something like recognition, or maybe understanding, maybe even pity. "Is your cause really so desperate?"

"As ever."

The lizard bowed his head, thinking. Dean could see the rise and fall of the Doctor's chest, Rose's tightened fingers around Sammy's hands, Sammy's trusting eyes that never left Deans face. He could feel the sweat rolling across the knuckles of the hand holding the unfamiliar gun.


	26. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Eight

So I'm getting married on Saturday, and I'll be gone for a week and a half after that. This means there will be a chapter or two extra this week and then none next week or the week after. Sorry! (But not sorry!)

Disclaimer: I own none of the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or any related rights.

...

The Doctor knew exactly how this was supposed to end. Yvash would end up a prisoner, and the Sea Devils would get more rights. The Doctor just really, really hoped that this wasn't one of those times when he accidentally forced history's hand. If he and his companions were the reason Yvash submitted . . . .

It was like the fires of Rome all over again.

Or London in 1666.

The dinosaurs.

You know, now that he thought about it, he really should stop meddling in Earth history. He seemed to be the cause of a lot of disasters (though at least this time he'd be helping a civil cause!).

Finally, Yvash raised his head, his eyes bright and defiant. "I hope my new friends forgive me, but I cannot allow myself to be used this way."

The Doctor felt his heart drop, and he saw Dean's trigger finger tense. This was not going to end well, not when he had two hunters who were trained to kill all things nonhuman with him, and _especially _not when they were waving guns at Rose.

Dean was just about to start shooting (the Doctor could see him tensing all the right muscles for action) when Rose stepped up to the plate.

Her hands were shaking, and the Doctor could see her desperately clenching them behind her back (she had, at this point, released Sammy's hand so she could step forward without bringing him into the line of fire), but the Sea Devils would never see it, not the way she held her shoulders, and not with the fire behind her eyes, the fire that was the reason the Doctor had so desperately wanted to travel with her in the first place. It was unquenchable, it was bright, and it was amazing. He loved everything about that fire, and without even seeing her face for himself, he knew that the Sea Devils could see firsthand the pieces of Bad Wolf that were still inside her, the goddess that she was in another time.

"I face my death with dignity," she said, and she masterfully ignored the tiny squeak Sammy gave behind her as well as the hard glare Dean shot her way. "But if I could have a moment with my family . . . for the sake of composure . . . ." She trailed off, looking to the Doctor to back up her story.

The Doctor opened his mouth, but to his surprise, it was Dean who jumped in. He looked right at Yvash and, with an impish grin, said, "Remember that blue box where you found me? It's a place of unity." He paused, looking for the right words. "An altar, if you like." At that, he grinned even wider and looked right at Sammy. "Gee, Sammy, we're pagans now."

Sammy just glared at his big brother.

The Sea Devils all glanced at each other. It was hard not to believe Rose and Dean; they both looked so confident in their stories, and both of them obviously had experience with cover identities. And the Doctor . . . well, that wasn't even his name, so he was definitely good at the coverup thing. The Doctor could see they didn't like this new proposal. The Sea Devils had probably tried to get into the TARDIS before and found that they couldn't, so letting their captives inside was just not sound strategy.

But it was Sammy that really cinched it. Sammy scrunched up his eyes, sniffled loudly, and whispered just loud enough for everyone to hear, "Dean, I want to go home."

That was it. That was the final push, the little nudge the Sea Devils needed. No grand lies, no queens making final please. Just a little boy who was lonely and scared and reaching out to his big brother. And these Sea Devils weren't monsters (though Dean might say otherwise). They were soldiers, kidnappers, and maybe they had their morals all backwards and confused in their desperate attempt to fulfill their mission (and the road to Hell was paved with the decisions of people like them), but they were not, at their core, barbarians.

"The female and the child may leave to make their peace, but the warrior and the queen's mate stay here," the Sea Devil leader said at last. (The Doctor could see Dean drawing himself up a bit when he heard the Sea Devil call him "the warrior," and then Dean immediately grinned and puffed out his chest a little more when the Doctor's cover story came up. When this was over, he was going to sit Dean down and have a little chat.)

The Doctor imagined that the expression on his face was fairly similar to the one on Dean's face, the look of pure relief. The object of his life was safe. Sammy was safe. Dean could relax now. And the Doctor could relax a bit more. Rose was safe. That was good. But he wasn't nearly as apt to throw away Dean's fate as Dean himself was (that was something they were going to have to address, actually, because the Doctor knew what it could do to a person, believing that he wasn't worth worrying over. He'd seen it in himself far too many times, but that was before he met Rose). So he stepped forward, "Look, Dean's still just a kid."

"Am not!" Dean said quickly.

"You are _not _helping your cause," the Doctor said through clenched teeth.

Dean just glared at him. "I'm not a kid, and I can take care of this myself. Stop trying to baby me."

"And stop trying to be a hero," Rose said, with that tired, worn-out tone of voice she always used to use on Jack whenever he was flirting too heavily or sometimes even the Doctor when he was going too fast or doing something "alien" again. It was the voice that came with time and tired acquaintance, and the Doctor knew it well. "If you're so intent on being noble or whatever it is you're trying to do, why don't you at least provide us with an escort, Dean?" She was talking to Dean, but her eyes were on the Doctor the whole time, and he knew the smile just at the corner of her mouth.

Yvash must have seen the hidden smile too, because he raised his head and tilted it at the Doctor in an unasked question. Did Rose really know what she was doing? She certainly seemed to think so. But Yvash could see the hopelessness of his own situation, could already feel the weight of bondage over his head. Could Rose really stop that from crushing them, too?

Of _course _she could. She was Rose.

"Just . . . go help your queen," the Doctor said, shaking his head in barely suppressed . . . was it annoyance or laughter? . . . at Dean. He waved his arm to show Dean the way, only to be rewarded with a glare and rolled eyes. Typical teenager. They always were a nightmare to parent. His own children, then his grandchildren, the great-grandchildren, then the kids like Adric . . . .

Dean hesitated only for a second, glancing first at the Sea Devils and then at the Doctor and then at the gun in his hands. He was the only one armed of the four of them, and the Doctor could practically see the wheels turning in that head of his. Leave the Doctor unguarded or leave Sammy alone?

The decision took all of four seconds.

Dean slowly inched his way over to stand by Rose's side, and the Doctor fell in behind him, ever mindful of the Sea Devils. They could get Rose and Samy into the TARDIS no problem, but the Sea Devils weren't about to give up _all _of their leverage. The Doctor just needed to find a way to get Dean inside, and then he'd figure his own situation out. Better to have everyone safe and face the Sea Devils alone than put another teenager in harm's way. He'd learned his lesson about companions who wanted to play the hero.

Blimey, he hadn't thought about Adric in _ages_. He was getting old if a simple teenager could make him go all nostalgic.

The similarities were there, though. Headstrong, smart (though Dean was about five hundred times more understated about his intelligence than Adric was), willing to fight the Doctor teeth and nail if they believed they were right. It was a wonder he'd even invited Dean into the TARDIS after the last fiasco.

But something about Dean made the Doctor trust him. Maybe because they'd already met. Maybe because Rose trusted him. Yes, that was probably it. Because Rose trusted him.

But he was glad he'd brought Dean. Maybe if he came along a bit more often, the Doctor could show him that not everything nonhuman was bad, open his eyes a bit more, get his finger off the trigger.

Who was he kidding? He didn't want Dean along out of the goodness of his heart. He liked Dean, and he was always up for more companions on the TARDIS. Made everything a little less lonely when he could drown out the emptiness in his head with human voices, even if they weren't as linked as Time Lords used to be. When this was all over, he'd ask Dean to join on permanently.

When Dean and the others stopped just ahead of him, the Doctor brought himself out of his thoughts and looked up. He couldn't help grin when he saw her. The TARDIS. His TARDIS. The most beautiful thing in all of creation, and she was all his.

He watched as Rose and Sammy disappeared inside and glanced over at Dean. Dean could force his way inside if he wanted, wave the gun around just long enough to distract them and let himself in.

Dean just stared straight ahead with his jaw clenched as the Sea Devils pulled him gently away from the TARDIS door.

The TARDIS was no weapon so long as the Doctor wasn't the one driving and so long as the Time War wasn't still raging all around him.


	27. Book Three: Ape, Chapter Nine

A/N: Three days til I get married! So excited!

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

Sammy was safe.

Dean couldn't stop the grin tugging at the corner of his mouth when he saw the TARDIS door close behind his brother's back, though he managed to keep it under control for the sake of appearances. He saw the door open just a crack and a small hand curl around the edges. Sammy peered out at him. The kid was worried, so he had to look like he had everything under control.

He didn't, of course. The only reason he wasn't blasting his way through the fish people to get him and the Doctor into the TARDIS? He couldn't figure out how to pull the friggin' trigger. It was different technology than he was used to. Not quite point-and-shoot. But that's what happens when you pick up a gun from before the dawn of the human race.

Seriously, this whole time travel concept was a lot harder than he thought it would be.

The lizard captive was doing pretty well for himself, though. Going the "noble prisoner" route, keeping them off their game. Dean could have even maybe learned to like the guy if he wasn't so fond of turning humans over to be dissected.

Something caught Dean's eye.

The fish who was trying so delicately to pull Dean aside and get him away from the TARDIS door let out a little grunt of surprise when Dean jerked his elbow away and made a bolt for the TARDIS. They'd expected a move like this, of course, but it didn't lessen the involuntary gasp when the fish guy wasn't holding on to anything anymore.

What _did _surprise them, though, was the blast that caught the fish guy in the stomach when he lunged for Dean.

Dean wasn't the one that pulled the trigger, of course, but he knew who had, and as he raced to grab the Doctor and drag him toward the TARDIS, he threw a grin over his shoulder at the lizard still buried under a ton of rubble.

The Doctor was fast, and he caught on quick, so Dean wasn't able to push him through the TARDIS like he'd planned. (The guy with the gun gets to safety last. Always keep a gun at the rear. Didn't this Doctor know these things?) Instead, Dean felt himself being pulled almost faster than his legs could carry him until he landed in a heap inside the TARDIS and heard the doors close behind the Doctor with a snap, followed immediately by pounding and shouting.

"Right back on schedule," the Doctor said, smiling and brushing his hands off. "Now Yvash doesn't have any outside pressure to cave to his captors, which means he will have to make his own decisions about them."

"Right. Because we were definitely worried about the course of history and not about getting out of there alive," Dean muttered through clenched teeth even though he knew what the answer was supposed to be. Put the cause and the good of humanity first. Save people, then worry about your own safety. Everyone else comes first. Of _course _history was more important.

Except not more important than Sammy.

Dean wasn't supposed to have an "except" to that rule, of course. Dad said so. But he did. He really wasn't interested in trying to break himself of that habit, either.

Dean felt little hands wrap themselves around his stomach, and he dropped the gun he was holding in surprise. When he realized it was Sammy, he relaxed and hugged his little brother tighter, then swung him up onto his shoulders. "So much for your project, huh, Sammy?"

"We could still get some things from the desert if you want," Rose said quietly. She kept smiling at the Doctor with this look like she'd completely enjoyed herself the whole time. Dean couldn't blame her. It was the rush of the hunt, or in this case of adventure, and everyone got caught up in it. That was half the fun of his job.

"We are _not _going anywhere new in this thing," Sammy said, his voice muffled because he was mostly talking into the flannel of Dean's worn-out shirt. "You'll try to take me to a desert on Mars and introduce me to evil Martian bad guys or something."

For some reason, Rose laughed at that.

"Are you sure?" the Doctor asked. "We could go somewhere more fun. There's this planet I've always wanted to visit with a sapphire waterfall. Imagine that! It's not really a waterfall, of course, but the sapphires get to the edge of this huge cliff and then burst over the edge and fall like . . . or maybe we could go to Barcelona where . . . ." The Doctor trailed off when he saw the look Dean was giving him.

"Sorry, Doc, but I can't let you pull my little brother into more traps like that last one. You very nearly got us all killed."

"To be fair," Rose said, "you were the one who started shooting at the Silurians."

Dean glared at her but didn't say anything. He hated it when the Doctor and his friends were right.

"Point is, Sammy's still a kid, and I still gotta take care of him."

"I'm bigger than you think I am," Sammy said. But he was still clinging so tightly to Dean's shirt that Dean definitely didn't believe him.

The Doctor and Dean both grinned at Sammy, and then the Doctor completely changed directions. He shrugged easily and practically jumped over the rails surrounding the middle of the TARDIS so that he could pull a whole bunch of levers. "Right then. Taking the Winchesters back home. I'll see what I can do to get you back with a few hours to spare for a last-minute project."

Sammy made a face, and Dean laughed. The little perfectionist.

Slowly, carefully, Sammy let go of Dean's shirt and crossed the TARDIS to stand by the Doctor. He tugged at the sleeve of the Doctor's ridiculous overcoat and whispered, "How do you make this thing go? Can I learn to drive it when I'm bigger?"

Even Dean couldn't help smiling at the huge grin that spread over the Doctor's entire face.

As Dean leaned back and watched his little brother "ooh" and "ahh" over the TARDIS and all its little levers, Rose saddled up next to him with her arms crossed and a huge grin plastered on her face.

"Well, you can only mean trouble," Dean said with a smile.

"That's more like the Dean I know," Rose said right back with a nice, big wink. "I saw you made a friend back there. I thought you didn't like things that weren't human?"

"I don't like things that kill humans," Dean said. "Which is most not-human things." He shrugged. "I dunno. Never met an alien before, don't know how to fight them. It was either play nice or wind up dead, so I played nice and he ended up being a decent person . . . lizard." Dean grinned sheepishly, not sure he was making sense. It was hard to talk to Rose, especially when she had already seen so much and had probably befriended aliens, held peace talks, fought alongside as well as against things that Dean could hardly imagine. It wasn't fair to drop him into a world like this.

Maybe he'd do some research.

Dean felt a small smile grow at the corners of his mouth. If by _research_, he meant marathoning _Star Trek . . . ._

"He's probably dead now," Rose said. She was watching his face for any reaction, and Dean wasn't going to give her one.

He shrugged. "It happens. He seemed like a soldier to me, and if that's the case, he knew what the risks were."

"Takes one to know one," Rose said.

Dean stiffened, not because he didn't want to be a soldier, but because Rose seemed to think it was some kind of joke. This was where he knew more than she did. She belonged in the world of aliens and time travel, and he'd take the gritty path full of blood and monsters. She didn't have to know about that war. She wasn't involved in it yet.

Rose frowned. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing."

Rose rolled her eyes and scooted closer to Dean. He felt his face going red, but she didn't seem to be blushing, so maybe she wasn't flirting with him but she was kinda _hot _and also kinda really, really close. Maybe if he reached over really carefully . . . .

But he didn't get to make a move on her. She was only moving closer so she could see his face better. She smiled at him so casually that Dean decided not to go for it. Not yet, anyway. "You know," she said, "I bet the Doctor would love to let you travel with us. You could come with us. See the universe. Meet aliens."

"There's real aliens and not just lizards who came before humans on Earth?"

Rose glanced at the Doctor and laughed. "Oh yeah."

"Awesome!" But then Dean looked where Rose was looking and saw Sammy trailing behind the Doctor, wide-eyed with wonder. He sighed.

"Sammy?" she asked before he could say anything.

"He's all I've got. Him and my dad," Dean said. "I can't leave them. They need me. I take care of them."

Rose looked like she was about to say something when the TARDIS screeched to a stop. He held onto the rail to keep from falling over, but Rose was so used to it that she just planted her feet and grinned at him. "I don't think he ever got his license," she whispered conspiratorially.

"Got that right," Dean said.

"Last stop, everybody off!" the Doctor announced.

Dean glanced at Rose, suddenly wondering what would happen if he _did _stay. He'd know more about what was out there, and that was definitely good knowledge to have. He could learn how to fight things if they found their way to this planet, and that was part of his job, wasn't it? Saving people?

"Dean, look! I told the Doctor where our room was, and guess where we are!" That was Sammy, standing just outside the TARDIS, jumping up and down.

Dean smiled and followed his little brother out of the TARDIS. He didn't turn around, not because he didn't want to, but because he had a feeling he'd want to stay.

If he had turned around, though, he would have seen the Doctor's sad smile and then the TARDIS slowly dematerializing. If he had turned around, he would have seen the little box full of sand and rocks right where the TARDIS used to be.

Sammy saw it, though.


	28. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 1

A/N: I'm back! Did you miss me? :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

"Are you ever coming out of there?"

The Doctor pounded on the door again, only to be greeted in return with a loud _thwack _and a shouted, "Oi! I'll come out when I'm good and ready!"

The Doctor frowned. "Donna," he said, trying a different approach, "we've landed."

"And it'll still be out there while I finish putting up my hair!" Donna retorted.

The Doctor ran his tongue over the top of his teeth and looked up at the ceiling of the TARDIS, wondering why he ever tried to get his way with Donna at all. It was a given: Donna would always win any argument. Always. Even when the Doctor was right, he was somehow wrong.

He wasn't used to that, but it was kinda fun.

Finally, the Doctor heard the lock turn and click, and then Donna emerged. He could understand now why she'd taken so long. Her hair was in tightly packed curls, pressed up against her cheeks, and the high collared dress she picked out from Wardrobe Six was just the right shade of green for the red in her hair. "You've put a lot of thought into this, haven't you?" he asked with a grin.

"Victorian London? Posh-ville Central?" Donna shot back with a grin. "It pays to prepare."

The Doctor grinned, thinking of the stacks of suitcases Donna had brought with her (and the additional stacks after she found that bazaar in Antilles Minor). "You look lovely."

Donna beamed, then paused when she saw what the Doctor was wearing. "Tell me you've at least washed that thing since that man slobbered Ood goop all over you."

The Doctor just shrugged. "What's wrong with this suit?"

"At least you've changed your tie," Donna sighed.

"And I ironed out the creases in the shirt," the Doctor said. He didn't know why he was explaining himself, but he felt like he should. Because it was Donna, and because if she got stuck on this for their entire trip, he'd never hear the end of it.

"I thought you said the Queen banished you," Donna said, still looking over his coat and looking for any signs of a stain.

"She did, but I've been banished from places before, and it's never really done much good, has it?" the Doctor laughed.

"And did you wear that suit when she met you?" Donna asked.

"What's your point?"

Donna just rolled her eyes and laughed. "Come on, then. Let's see how long it takes before someone tries to arrest you."

The Doctor grinned after his friend as he let her grab his arm and practically drag him out of the TARDIS; he didn't mind the dragging so much, not when it meant she was excited to be in a new world. She'd only recently asked to go home, after all, and he was trying to be careful to steer her clear of the worst places.

Of course, he was very bad at that.

"Doctor!" Donna shouted, whirling on him before he had the chance to really take in the new surroundings. That was her Mad at the Doctor voice. "Doctor, where are we?"

The Doctor gulped and scratched the back of his head, ruffling his hair. He took a deep breath, tasting the air. He scrunched up his nose before, finally, he turned back to Donna with a wide smile and a shrug. "Well, Dorothy, we're in Kansas."

"Kansas?"

"Kansas."

Donna looked down at her dress and at the hair she'd spent hours on, then up at the Doctor. "I hate you."

The Doctor grinned and watched Donna run back into the TARDIS to change. It wouldn't take her long to change, he knew, not if she was just going to throw on some jeans and a tee shirt. Kansas wasn't worth the whole wardrobe.

The Doctor leaned against the TARDIS and stroked the side of his magnificent ship. "What is it?" he whispered. "Why did you bring us here?" His entire face lit up in a grin. "I know you've got something cooking in there. Some kind of adventure."

The TARDIS didn't move, but the Doctor felt, faintly, that she was smiling.

The Doctor leaned back, this time facing away from the TARDIS, and looked out into the hills. He could just make out an old house, barely standing, one that looked like it had weathered too many tornado seasons. And, just through the gap in the trees around the property, there was a shiny, black car. He could only see the headlights and a bit of the front, but he knew it well.

The Winchesters.

The Doctor frowned. This could be delicate. It had been his experience that the Winchesters had almost as much danger following them as he did (though that was, admittedly, only what he had seen in his limited time with them), and he'd been so hoping that he would be able to take Donna somewhere nice.

He seriously thought about taking the TARDIS somewhere else and letting the Winchesters deal with whatever it was they were hunting. Those boys could handle just about anything. Demons, aliens, nothing stood a chance against them. They could handle themselves just fine.

Oh, who was he kidding? The Doctor sighed. "Allons-y," he muttered, mostly to himself but also, just a little bit, to the TARDIS.

"Donna, I'm going to have a look around," he said. Better that he go first. He wasn't sure where he was in the Winchester's timeline, and there was no telling how they'd react to him. There had, after all, been some pretty rough spots recently.

"Don't go wandering off and getting lost without me."

The Doctor grinned. That was usually his line. "I'll do my best."

It wasn't long before the Doctor heard the familiar sound of classic rock. The quiet guitar chords of one of Dean's favorites. When he got closer, he could actually hear words:

"On a dark desert highway

Cool wind in my hair

Warm smell of colitas

Rising up through the air

Up ahead in the distance

I saw a shimmering light

My head grew heavy

And my sight grew dim

I had to stop for the night."

The Doctor grinned. "Good song."

But the music stopped before the verse could go on any further, and the Impala's headlights suddenly flipped on, blinding the Doctor in their glare. He held up his hands to shield his eyes and to show that he didn't mean any harm. "Blimey! That's a way to greet an old friend."

The headlights dimmed, and as the Doctor's eyes adjusted, he heard the sound of a car door slamming and footsteps rapidly approaching. Someone stopped directly in front of him, and when the Doctor's eyes were finally back to normal, he couldn't help but smile.

"Hey, Doc," Dean said. But this was a much younger Dean that the Doctor had seen recently. Sixteen, seventeen, maybe eighteen. Definitely not old enough to sell his soul or get wrapped up in larger plots.

The Doctor shook his head. He'd seen these boys through more than he liked to admit, and it almost wasn't fair the way they kept meeting. He found himself wishing he could see the younger Winchesters when he saw their futures, wishing he could have the younger, more innocent boys.

Innocent. That was a laugh.

But when he had the younger versions, it hurt. Because he knew what happened to them later.

Still, it was nice to see a familiar face, and he beamed at Dean. "It's been a long time, hasn't it?" he asked, mostly as an exploratory question. He wasn't sure, after all, when Dean had seen him last, not with their crazy timelines.

Dean just grinned back at him. "Way too long for my tastes. How ya' been? You look older."

"Thanks," the Doctor said absently. "You look younger."

"Something to look forward to, then," Dean said, waving him off.

The Doctor smiled, glad to see the teenage Dean again. He missed this, the joking, the smiling (mostly the smiling), the untempered wit, the unscarred skin. He looked past him into the Impala, and this time, the smile died. "Where's Sam?"

Dean's entire expression changed. Suddenly, his whole countenance darkened, and he stared off at something beyond the Doctor with gritted teeth and a locked jaw. "With my dad."

The Doctor raised an eyebrow. "You don't sound too happy about it."

Dean glanced at the Doctor under one raised eyebrow to mirror the Doctor's expression. Then, his face hardened. "Just drove myself all this way from Flagstaff. Dad sent me here."

"Alone?"

"I think he's still pissed at me."

"For what?"

"Losing Sammy."

The Doctor frowned, but it didn't seem like Dean was willing to give any further explanation. Instead, Dean just shrugged and grinned at the Doctor. "It's fine. My dad's the best hunter in the world, and if I can't keep Sammy safe, well, no one else in the world can besides my dad."

Hollow words, the Doctor thought. But he didn't say that out loud. Not to a smile so desperate.

"So, who have you got with you this time? Rose or Martha Jones?" Dean asked suddenly, straightening up. It was his signal to the Doctor to drop the conversation .

"Actually, neither," the Doctor said with a sad smile. But if Dean wasn't going to answer to questioning glances, the Doctor definitely wasn't going to respond to Dean's raised eyebrow. "Her name's Donna."

Dean laughed. "I was right. There's always a new girl."

"Oi! Not like that!"

Dean just laughed again.

The Doctor rolled his eyes, then crossed his arms across his chest. "So tell me, Dean Winchester, what brings you all the way out here?"

Dean laughed. "Oh, the usual. People are disappearing, and I'm here to find out why. You're welcome to help—that is, if you think you're ready to face _my _kind of monsters. I seem to remember you didn't believe in them."

The Doctor snorted. Yeah. That was back before he'd seen as much as he had seen now.


	29. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

"And who is this?" the redhead asked. She raised both her eyebrows at him, like she was appraising him.

Dean smirked at her. "An old friend of the Doctor's."

"Old?" She scrunched up her nose. "What are you, sixteen?"

"Seventeen," Dean said. Old enough to drop out of high school, but he wasn't about to say that around the Doctor. He remembered how the guy could be about things like that. Pushy. Preachy. The works. "I've known the Doctor since I was a kid, though."

"Uh-huh." The redhead seemed to consider for only a moment before, finally, she broke out into a smile. "Well, it's nice to meet you. I'm Donna."

"Dean," he said, taking the outstretched hand. "I see the Doctor still has great taste." He smiled his biggest smile at her. With the accent and the attitude, she could be fun . . . .

"Stop it," the Doctor said, then stopped and smiled. "Starting to repeat myself."

But Donna just looked pleased. "Oh, let him. Bless." And she smiled at Dean with the smile that adults were always giving him, the look that said they still didn't think he was old enough to be a hunter but they were just putting up with his desire to be treated like an adult because they didn't know what else to do when he was so insistent in his demands.

Dean frowned.

"So, Doc, what happened to Martha?" Dean asked. He figured he was safer with that question than asking about where Rose went. Anyone with eyes could see that they had feelings for each other, and he was _not _venturing down that path until he was better prepared.

"She left," the Doctor said. That was it. No long-winded explanation. Still a touchy subject, so it must have happened fairly recently, Dean gathered.

"That's a shame. I liked Doctor Jones."

Donna grinned. She didn't seem at all jealous of Dean and the Doctor talking about the past. It was almost enough to make up for the fact that she'd treated him like a kid earlier.

"Anyway, back to the point," the Doctor said. "You were telling me about this house."

"Right." Dean leaned back on the hood of his Impala, glad that at least Dad had let him take the car. It was the one thing Dean knew was his when they were separated. Everything else was Sammy's, but this—the car—it was the only thing Dad had ever really given him.

"There've been stories about this place going back at least a couple centuries. People disappearing. Cars left running, picnics uneaten. Just gone." Dean leaned forward and let the grin and the thrill overtake him. "But that's not the weird part."

"No, of course not," Donna said, rolling her eyes. "Why would disappearing people be weird?"

"Comes with the job, Donna," Dean shrugged. "Most cases aren't even really on our radar unless at least three people are missing. One's an accident, two's a coincidence." Dean grinned over at the Doctor, thinking of the grocery store ghost and how it had only killed one person before they jumped in. "There are, of course, exceptions."

The Doctor just grinned back, but the smile looked sadder than before. The Doctor was definitely older, and he kept looking at Dean like . . . like he knew something awful and didn't want to tell him.

Dean shook his shoulders out to dispel that feeling. "Anyway, the _really _weird part is that people _appear _in this house, too."

"They what?" the Doctor asked. It was the first time he'd looked really interested.

Dean grinned again. "Told you it was weird."

"Hang on," Donna said. "How can people just appear places? Did they, I don't know, teleport?"

"Nice one, Donna," the Doctor said, nodding furiously.

Dean laughed. "If they'd teleported, they'd have known where they were—I mean, theoretically speaking." He shrugged and tried not to think about the fact that they were talking about teleportation like it was no big deal. Whenever the Doctor was around, things always got a little weird. "But these people just show up in this house, out of the blue, with no idea how they got there or even what day it is. It's like something messed with their heads."

The Doctor seemed suddenly silent.

"Any ideas?" Dean recognized the look on the Doctor's face.

Silence.

"Oh, don't mind him. He gets like that sometimes," Donna said. "I say this case sounds like it needs investigating." She grinned almost as broadly as the Doctor could grin. "What do you say, Doctor?"

"Be careful," the Doctor said.

That was new. Usually, the Doctor jumped into adventures without a second thought. Maybe he was getting slow in his old age?

No, it was something else.

"You know what's going on here, don't you, Doc?" Dean whispered as they followed Donna into the front hall of the old house.

"I've got an idea."

"An idea worth sharing?"

"Not just now," the Doctor said. "Because if I'm right . . . ."

"I forgot you do that," Dean frowned. "You like to think you're all mysterious, but I tell you what—I solve mysteries for a living."

"You kill things for a living."

"One man's insult . . . ."

"Oi! Boys!" Donna had her hands on her hips and was glaring at them. "Are you two going to just sit there arguing or are you going to do some actual gumshoe-ing?"

"Oh, I like her," Dean said, but not loud enough for Donna to hear.

"Why do you think I brought her along?"

"I was under the impression she brought herself, and you're just along for the ride," Dean said, and he couldn't not grin.

Donna was standing in the front entryway, scraping some of the caked-on dust off the front end table. There were pictures in the frames once, Dean imagined, but they were covered in dust, dirt, and spiderwebs. If he squinted, he could barely make out the faint shape of faces. "I don't get it. It looks like no one's been here in ages. But you said people are disappearing here, right? And you wouldn't be here investigating if the disappearances weren't recent."

The Doctor nodded his approval. "Nice one, Donna."

Dean nodded. "Kids on dares, amateur investigators, you name it. All gone, all within the past ten years."

"You'd think they would have left footprints or something," Donna said. "It looks like the dust has been here for ages. When was the last disappearance?"

"About a week ago," Dean said. "It took a few days for word to travel, and then it took me a few days to drive here."

"So how come I don't see anything to show people were here?"

Dean just smiled. This was where he was good, where he could prove he was worth it to the Doctor, if not to his dad. He'd done this his whole life, after all, and maybe he wasn't as good as Dad yet, but he was definitely better than the Doctor. At hunting, that is. "Not _inside _the house, anyway."

The Doctor sighed. "They never got in the house." He ran a hand down his face. "They were taken on the grounds."

"But we're inside," Donna pointed out.

"And if I believed in good luck, I'd say we had plenty of it right now," Dean said. That was the nice part about traveling with the Doctor. His luck seemed to be much better than Dean's, at least in the whole "getting out of places with everyone alive and intact" department. "But there's no such thing."

"Oh, I don't know," Donna said, smiling at the Doctor. "Sometimes things work out."

Dean shook his head. "If we're still alive, it's because whatever this thing is wants us alive. We're the first ones inside in five years."

"I thought you said the disappearances started ten years ago," Donna said.

Dean grinned. Yep, he definitely liked Donna. She could keep up. "Yeah, but five years ago, someone took a tape player with them."

"Tape? As in casette tapes?" Donna said it like it was ridiculous. But then, she was with a time traveller . . . .

"That's what I was doing in the car when you came, Doc," Dean said. "Listening, trying to figure out where they were in the house so I could start there. I've played it a hundred times over, but it's garbled."

"Can I take a look?"

Dean shrugged his assent and led them back to the Impala and out over the lawn. He was just about to unlock the passenger side when he saw something, just a flash, out of the corner of his eye. "Did you . . . ?" But when he looked, it was gone.

That was definitely a bad sign.

The Doctor seemed edgy, too. Maybe he'd finally realized how dangerous Dean's line of work was, or maybe it was one of those rare times when they were facing a Doctor monster and not a Dean monster. Whatever it was, the Doctor hardly spoke. And that never happened.

Even Donna noticed. "Doctor?" she asked quietly. "Are you alright?"

The Doctor blinked at her. "Hmm? Oh, yeah. Just fine. Fit as a fiddle, that's me."

Donna just rolled her eyes. "You know you try too hard."

The Doctor shrugged right back.

"Okay," Dean said, breaking in as he started the car. "Listen close. The sound's not too good; the tape's pretty banged up."

Both the Doctor and Donna leaned forward. The Doctor put on some brown-rimmed glasses (as if they could somehow help him hear better).

"The first bit's a little hard to hear. Mostly, he just talks about what day it is, what his mission is, blah blah blah captain's log type stuff," Dean said. "Let me skip to the interesting part."

It took him a bit to fast-forward, but he'd done this so many times that he had it down to the second. As soon as he pressed play, the heavy breathing started. "Oh man," said the voice on the tape. "You won't believe what I'm seeing. That thing just moved!" There was a lot of static, then, "I think it's getting closer." A scream followed and, then, nothing.

"Oh, that is creepy," Donna said.


	30. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 3

A/N: I've been really enjoying the two different types of reviews for the last story: the people who figured out the monster and the ones who didn't. I must be doing something right if I can still fool some people, at least. :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or any related rights.

...

The Doctor didn't even check to see if anyone was behind him. He'd made this mistake once, and he wasn't going to make it again.

"Doc, where are you going?" Dean called after him.

"Doctor! Doctor, tell me what's happening!" Donna shouted at the same time.

But he got to the TARDIS, and it didn't look harmed. He walked all the way around her, just to be sure, before he threw the doors open and jumped inside.

Dean caught up soon after and threw the doors open as well. "What was that all about?" he asked in between gasps.

The Doctor spoke through gritted teeth. "The thing that's in there . . . maybe there's more than one; I don't know . . . I've faced it before. And, well, the thing is, they very nearly trapped me and stole my TARDIS, and I'm not exactly keen to let them do that again." He reached around, but Dean was blocking the way. "Hold down that button there," he said rather than try to push through.

"And what exactly am I doing?"

"Just keep holding it!"

By this time, Donna had caught up as well, but instead of questioning the Doctor, she just laughed at Dean. "Don't argue with him, sweetheart. He gets like this sometimes."

"Doesn't it drive you insane?"

"Oh yeah!"

The Doctor braced himself for another repeat of what _always _happened when his companions got together, and that was the teasing. Sometimes it started with arguing, but always there was teasing. But Dean didn't start in on that; he was not to be deterred. "Why am I holding down this thing?"

"Oh, you can stop now," the Doctor said. And with that, he ushered them all out the doors of the TARDIS and closed them, locking them tight. "Stand back, Donna," he said, mostly because Dean seemed to follow orders instinctively and he knew he didn't have to hold him back.

"What's going on?" Donna asked in her most demanding voice. Oh, she was not going to be pleased about this later.

As soon as he was sure the TARDIS had dematerialized enough that he could turn his back, he whirled around to the two very confused, very annoyed faces behind him. "Right," he said, clapping his hands together. "I haven't done that in a long time. I'll have to turn it back off when I'm done."

"Are you just going to stand there talking nonsense, or are you going to actually say something?" Donna asked, her hands on her hips.

Dean stopped glaring at the Doctor for just a bit to grin at Donna. That was the _last _thing the Doctor needed: two people who knew how to push his buttons working together.

"I turned on the HADS."

"The what?" Donna tilted her head at him.

"The HADS."

"The what?" But Dean was grinning.

"You heard me," the Doctor said, not in the mood for Dean's childishness. "It stands for Hostile Action Displacement System." He blew all his breath out at once. "I haven't used it in _ages_, lifetimes, really, but there's nothing else for it."

"Well come on then, Space Man," Donna said. "What does it do?"

"It takes the TARDIS out of danger."

"And leaves us _behind_?" Yep, there was the Mad at The Doctor face Donna was so good at making. He was going to get an earful later.

"Nice move, Doc," Dean said. "Keep the best weapon we've got where we _can't use it_."

"The TARDIS is not a weapon!"

"I can think of a few uses for it," Dean countered.

"You try, and I'll have to stop you."

"Right, because you're so scary," Dean said, rolling his eyes.

Oh, right. This Dean still thought he was an idiot who couldn't hunt properly and befriended monsters. Well, there were some things he missed about the old Dean and some things he didn't.

"Boys," Donna said in her best "commanding" voice.

"If you're so scared of this thing, why didn't you just leave with your ship?" Dean continued.

"I'm not leaving that thing here on Earth where it can terrorize more people," the Doctor responded in kind. "And I'm definitely not leaving you here alone to fight it. You've got a life ahead of you, important things to do, lives to save. I'm not about to let that end here."

Dean looked taken aback. And then the Doctor realized what he'd said. He'd meant it, of course, that Dean was important. But the Doctor knew from experience that Dean wasn't used to hearing that and didn't take it very well. He was, in fact, the worst at taking compliments out of anyone the Doctor had ever met.

"OI!" Donna shouted. She'd given up on trying to get their attention normally and grabbed Dean by the overlarge leather jacket. She pointed at something over the hill. "Something's watching us."

Both the Doctor and Dean turned around at that, both scanning the horizon. "I don't see anything," Dean said.

"You dumbo, of course you do. It's right there," Donna said, pointing.

"You mean the graveyard angel that's been around for hundreds of years?" Dean said.

Donna looked subdued, so the Doctor quickly jumped to her rescue. "That's no statue."

"I thought so!" Donna said. "I saw it move. I mean, I didn't _see _it move. But it was over there, and now it's over here," she said, pointing to illustrate her point.

"You wouldn't have seen it move anyway," the Doctor said.

"I'm assuming you know what they are?" Dean said. He had a "patient" smile plastered onto his face, but the Doctor knew that he was treading dangerous ground. He hadn't explained himself, and Dean was definitely not used to being the one with the questions. He was supposed to be the one with the answers, after all. The big brother.

Some things never changed.

"Angels," the Doctor said at last.

"No such thing," was Dean's reply.

"Not that kind of angel," the Doctor said. "The weeping angels."

"Right. Because that doesn't sound like something you pulled out of a badly written horror story," Dean said. "You can stop messing with me, Doc. I know you don't think much of what I do—"

"Which is what, by the way?" Donna interrupted. "I mean, I get that you're some kind of military. Gung-ho and taking orders and all that."

"He's a hunter," the Doctor said.

"What, like a deer hunter?" Donna asked, wrinkling her nose in disgust.

Dean laughed. "I hunt things a little bigger than deer."

"He hunts monsters," the Doctor said. He kept glancing up at the ridge Donna had pointed out, just to be sure, but the statue hadn't moved yet. That didn't mean they were safe, though. These things usually hunted in pairs—so that one could be frozen and the other could be moving in case they were spotted. Clever angels.

"Monsters?"

"You know. Vampires, werewolves, ghosts."

"So, you're what, Buffy the Vampire Slayer?"

Dean grinned. "Without the British butler." But then he turned right back to the Doctor. "Okay, give me the skinny on these things. Weaknesses, what kills them. I've got an arsenal in the trunk."

"They can't be killed. Not with any of the weapons you're thinking of," the Doctor said.

"Then tell me what I can do." Dean had that face on. The game face. It meant he was ready to receive orders. That face went away after time and became a "give orders" face, but he was still young. He still had his dad.

The Doctor sighed and settled in for the explanation that he knew they didn't have time for. "The weeping angels. Lonely assassins. Short version? They aren't statues. They only look like statues. They're quantum locked so that they literally turn to stone in the sight of any living being. It's a perfect defense mechanism."

"So I'll kill them when I'm not looking at them."

"These things are way too fast for that. In the time it takes you to blink, they can cross the room and kill you," the Doctor said.

"So I won't blink."

"Yes, that's the general plan," the Doctor said. "Don't blink, and they can't get to you."

"So we just stand there, not blinking, uintil our eyes get tired?" Donna sighed. "That doesn't sound like much of a plan to me."

The Doctor scratched the back of his head. "Well, see, the last time, I had help. This girl, her name was Sally Sparrow, she helped me trick the angels into looking at each other and freezing them forever."

"Can't we do that now?"

"Not until we know how many angels there are," the Doctor said. "If we let one of them escape, this house is still going to be a death trap for any human being who stumbles across it."

"So, we get them to look at each other, or we get someone else to do it. Any other options? What if we just blew the things up while they were still stone?" Dean asked.

"Do you really want hundreds and hundreds of pieces of living stone scattered around the area?"

Dean frowned.

"What else can we do?" Donna asked quietly. "How can we help, Doctor?"

"We have to be careful and keep alert," the Doctor said. "If you let these things touch you, you'll get sent back in time."

"Not killed?" Dean asked. "Doesn't seem too dangerous."

"The only psychopaths to kill you nicely," the Doctor said, grinning at the repeat. "They just send you into the past and live off of all the lost time, the potential energy of your life." He stared hard at Dean. "And they'd make a fine meal out of you, Dean Winchester."

"I thought we agreed that you weren't going to tell me about what happens in my future."

Donna raised both eyebrows. "What, you mean he meets you when you're older?"

"Older and legal," Dean said with a wink.

"Stop it, you two," the Doctor said. "Look." When he pointed between the trees by the house, he turned to keep an eye on the one over the ridge to stop it from moving.

"Oh great. Two more of them," Donna said.

"So we can't stop looking at them, and if they even touch us, we're dead sometime in the past," Dean said. "But you've got a time machine, right? Can't you just go back for us?"

The Doctor shook his head. "I sent her away. The last time, with Sally, the angels wanted my TARDIS. They could feed off her energy until they burnt out the sun."

"So, no TARDIS, no guns, no blinking. Am I leaving anything out?" Dean asked.

"Well, in a bit, we're also going to have no sunlight," Donna pointed out. "Sunset's coming."

"Yeah. Best time to hunt is at night, when the monsters come out," Dean said with a shrug.

"Yeah," Donna repeated. "The best time to hunt is at night." But she wasn't talking about Dean hunting.


	31. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 4

A/N: I'm having way too much fun with this story. I've hit a writing sprint! :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

Unstoppable monsters. This was his kind of hunt.

Dean stopped fingering the gun he'd tucked into his jeans; he wasn't going to need it anymore, and he'd really only brought it for backup. "Okay. Here's how this works. Donna, you stay here and keep your eye on the angel at the graveyard. How loud can you shout?"

"Oh, I don't think you'll have a problem hearing her," the Doctor said with a smile.

"Good." Dean straightened up. "As long as you're here, that one can't go anywhere, right?

The Doctor nodded.

"Good. Doc, you and me are headed into that house. You say we need to know how many there are? We're going to investigate."

"And how are you going to count them all unless you get them in one place?" Donna asked. "If they all look like angel statues, won't they look alike?"

Dean definitely liked Donna. She was good. She'd have made a good hunter in another life, before the Doctor made her all soft like he did to everyone around him. "I've got some gear in the trunk of my car."

"I told you, no guns," the Doctor said. Oh yeah. He had rules like that.

"Paintballs, Doc. You made your point about how effective bullets are," Dean said. He grinned. It was good to be back on the horse, to be hunting and doing things and not desperately searching for Sammy.

He frowned. That had been the worst. The not knowing. The wondering whether Sammy had been taken by some monster. And then Dad came home, and it was like being nine all over again and not taking the shot to save Sammy.

But that was past. He wasn't going to think about that now. He was in the middle of a job, and he didn't get to be selfish by distracting himself with thoughts like that.

"Okay, I'll just stay here then," Donna said.

"We'll come back for you," Dean promised.

"Oi, did I _say _I was scared?"

"Atta girl," Dean grinned. "Come on, Doc. Let's go investigate."

It took them a while to reach the house from there they were before, and Dean felt every step of the way. He could hear every gust of wind, every snapped twig. This was insane. How was he supposed to kill a rock?

"See anything yet?" he asked the Doctor through the corner of his mouth.

"Just those two in the trees."

"Yeah." He said, then took a deep breath. "Here's the problem. My car's parked over that way."

"And you said your paintball gear is in the trunk?"

"Yep."

The Doctor sighed and ran his hands through his hair. "Right. I'll keep an eye on our friends, and you get the tagging equipment."

"Like tracking animals on a safari," Dean said. When the Doctor raised an eyebrow at him, he just laughed. "What? I've lived my life in a motel room. You think I haven't seen the Discovery Channel?"

The Doctor just laughed.

Dean looked dubiously at the angels and then at the Doctor and then decided that, well, he wasn't going to get anywhere if he didn't just do it. So he took a deep breath and jumped right between the two angels on either side of his trunk.

"Doctor!" he shouted despite himself when he saw a stone hand just inches from his face.

"Sorry, sorry," the Doctor said just as quickly. "I blinked."

"Well, try not to do that, huh? At least until I get around this thing," he said.

On the plus side, he could keep his eye on at least one of them as long as he was looking at the hand in front of him, so he kept his eyes trained on the hand while he felt around for the lock to his trunk.

"Okay, Doc, I'm about to blink. You looking at both of them?"

"Yeah."

"Okay. Blinking now." Dean closed his eyes, letting them water just a bit to heal over the dryness from not blinking for so very long. It was hard, this not blinking thing. When he opened his eyes again, the hand was still there, and he backed up just a bit so he could also see the other one. "Your turn."

The Doctor closed his eyes for what felt like a ridiculously long period of time (though Dean knew it was only a few seconds). "Okay," the Doctor said when he opened his eyes again. "I should be good for a while. I'll let you know next time I need to blink."

"Yeah, just don't go overstretching yourself. If your eyesight gets too blurry, that might not count as actually being able to see these things."

"You know, you have a point there. I'm not actually sure what best qualifies as looking at the angels and what doesn't. I mean, what if you see the movement in the corner of your—"

"Now is not the time," Dean said through gritted teeth.

"Right. Of course."

Dean grabbed the paintball gun and the paintballs he had with him. It was lucky, really. He'd only brought it because he and Uncle Bobby had been planning a weekend together, and for some reason, Uncle Bobby was determined to force them into "doing normal boy things." Dean said he preferred target practice, so they compromised.

But when Dean shut the trunk of the car, he looked away for just a second from the hand. The Doctor was still looking, but for just a second, Dean had blocked his view with the trunk. He instinctively dropped to the ground when he realized his mistake, and that hunter's instinct was the only thing that saved him. When he looked up again, there was a face inches from his own, leaning over, with hands so close Dean could almost feel them.

"Crap," Dean muttered. Now he was stuck staring up at an angel. "Can I touch these things while they're still stone?"

"Yes, but _be careful_," the Doctor said.

"When am I ever not?"

The Doctor chose not to answer that question. It was probably for the best.

Carefully, slowly, Dean slide out from underneath the angel. He kept the paintball gun close by so that, as soon as he could turn, he spun himself and fired.

This time, the angel was in a sprinting position. But now it had blue plastered all over its face.

"One," Dean muttered. This was going to take much longer than he thought it would.

"We're losing daylight."

"Right," Dean said. "I'm not sure how much light we'll find in the house. You got any brilliant ideas, Doc?"

The Doctor just grinned in response and flipped open the blue tube Dean had seen before (but he'd been young back then, and the name of the blue thing escaped him; it hadn't been as important to his little-kid mind to remember details like that). It made some kind of noise, and then the Impala's headlights came on.

"If you drain the battery before the night's over, you're paying for the replacement," Dean said.

"Most people just say thank you," the Doctor said.

Dean rolled his eyes and popped the other angel with a red paintball. "Figure we should color code them. You can have Red, I'll take Blue, and we'll get to that porch that way," he said as he reloaded. He didn't need to see the gun to reload.

"Right." The Doctor kept his blue tube out just in case, but the Impala's headlights would be enough to keep the place at least dimly lit. Not ideal, of course, but then, when had a case ever been easy? Especially where the Doctor was concerned?

They backed up together to the front door, back to back, carefully taking each step and scanning their lines of sight. They had almost 360-vision, but it wasn't enough, and they both knew it. They just had to hope that there were just three angels.

"I wonder how Donna's holding up," the Doctor said.

"She doesn't have headlights," Dean agreed. He liked Donna; it was obvious that she knew exactly how to handle the Doctor, and it was nice to see that there was someone, at least, who could make the Doctor stop acting like an insufferable know-it-all. He really hoped that the angel hadn't gotten to her by now.

"She can handle herself," the Doctor said. Of course, they both knew that he was saying it to convince himself more than anything, but Dean wouldn't say that out loud. There were some lies that were meant to be told.

"Just to be on the safe side, though, we should really hurry up," Dean said.

So their crabwalking got faster, their steps a little wider. But they were not sloppy. They took their time in every room of the house, taking care to check every possible hiding place. In a house this old, there were almost certainly hidden passages. They only found one, and there was no angel inside it.

After every room, Dean stationed the Doctor at the nearest entryway to keep watch while he—working as quickly as possible to be sure that no angel could sneak up on them—set up a string across every doorway and entrance. It was hardly detectable, but it wasn't foolproof. Still, it was the only way they had to check if the angels were in the rooms while they weren't in there.

The sun had nearly set now, and Dean could practically feel the Doctor's worry. "I'll be fine here on my own if you want to go after her," Dean said at last. It was a lie, of course. He'd probably get sent back in time by one of these angels. But the Doctor was getting sloppy. He'd almost let Blue sneak up on them twice now.

"She'll be fine," the Doctor said again. "We only have the kitchen and the piano room left."

"Fine," Dean said. But he kept his ears open just in case. The Doctor said that Donna was plenty loud, so he figured she'd have the sense to holler if she got in real trouble.

He was so distracted he almost walked right into Red, and that was embarrassing, especially after he'd just been mentally berating the Doctor for doing the exact same thing..


	32. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 5

A/N: Getting a cold = lots of time for writing. And soup. Lots of soup.

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

"Maybe there's just two of them, and the graveyard angel left Donna alone," Dean offered.

The Doctor grimaced. He knew that Dean was just trying to be helpful, but really, he was only making things worse, making him more worried. "A human alone at night when the sunlight's fading and the nearest backup is cornered? I doubt it."

Dean just frowned and kept running.

They had worked out a good system to make sure the angels couldn't follow them. Dean would run for five seconds, then turn around and shout, "Run!" Then, Dean would watch the angels behind them to keep them from moving while the Doctor ran to meet up with Dean.

It was a good system until they got over the hill and the angels disappeared from view.

"Book it," Dean whispered in the Doctor's ear as soon as the Doctor made it over the hill to join him. Without another word, they both turned and ran as fast as they could, almost half the distance between the hill and where they had parked the TARDIS. Finally, the Doctor turned around, just in case the angels had caught up with them in the long seconds that they had their backs to them.

He was glad he did. He could see both the red-striped and blue-striped angels just over the hill, and it was obvious from their posture that they had been sprinting.

Dean was a little farther ahead than the Doctor (he hadn't stopped when the Doctor had, though they had been racing neck-and-neck until then), so he turned around, too, and shouted, "Run!"

The Doctor turned, glad that Dean was used to hunting in the dark and had better nocturnal eyesight than most humans. It helped that there was still a faint glow of headlights over the hill, but even Dean wouldn't be able to see them coming for much longer.

They continued like that, painfully, slowly, until the Doctor could see the faint outline, in the moonless night, of someone standing close by, arms raised.

"Please be Donna," he muttered.

Dean waited until the Doctor had turned to keep his gaze on the other two angels before he whispered, "I'll go check." (The Doctor hadn't meant for Dean to hear his whispered almost-prayer, but the kid was trained like a warrior. Of course he heard.)

It was hard to stand there, taking careful, tentative steps back in the general direction Dean had run, waiting for some sign from Dean. But he knew he couldn't just abandon everything and run after his friends, no matter how much he wanted to.

He felt his eyes watering. "Dean?" he shouted over his shoulder. When there was no answer, the Doctor decided to risk one glance over his shoulder.

It was all one, fluid movement: he blinked as he turned, and when he turned his head all the way, he saw two figures where there was one, and that was enough to know that Dean was there safely.

When he turned again, though, the two angels he was supposed to be watching were only a few meters away.

"Doctor!" He heard the urgency in Dean's voice, but he had already risked glancing over his shoulder.

"I'm a bit busy!" he shouted back.

"Doc, it's not Donna."

The Doctor felt both his hearts drop into his stomach. "Right," he said through clenched teeth. "We're not going anywhere we might run into news of her. As soon as we cross her timeline, we can't go after her."

"I hate to point this out, Doc, but you'd need the TARDIS to go after her, and unless you know how to teleport . . . ."

The Doctor kept his gaze on the angels. He was too upset to think about blinking, and as his gaze hardened, it became even easier to resist the temptation to let his eyelids droop.

His eyes hurt, though.

Dean's voice was getting closer now. "This one's smaller than the other ones. Think we've found a . . . I don't know; what would you call a group of weeping angels? . . . a flock? They've got wings, after all." It was obvious Dean was grasping at straws, trying to find something to keep his mind and, more importantly, the Doctor's mind off of losing Donna. "Hey, if it's a smaller angel, do you think she didn't get sent as far back in time?"

"I wouldn't know without finding out where they sent her," the Doctor said. He continued to take furtive steps back, trying to follow the sound of Dean's voice. "How are your eyes holding up?"

"I'm almost having to squint."

"We need to get closer to your headlights for this to work."

"I've got an idea."

The Doctor frowned. The way Dean said it so cautiously, and not as confidently as he usually did when he knew he was right, well . . . "It's the only one we've got," he admitted. "As long as it's better than just standing back-to-back until we lose the light entirely."

"Sorry about this," Dean said. His voice was suddenly at his ear, and the Doctor realized with a jolt that Dean was picking him up! Before he could protest, Dean flung him over his shoulder, and suddenly, the Doctor was facing the smaller angel while Dean charged at the red-striped and blue-striped angels the Doctor had been watching before.

"Dean!" was all the Doctor could say as he pushed against Dean's back to try and hold himself almost upright so he had a better field of vision.

"I figured it was better to ask forgiveness than permission," Dean said. "Besides, you're about my height, so I figured I could carry you. Turns out I was right."

"A little warning would have been nice."

"Most people just say thank you."

The Doctor frowned, but he knew Dean's plan was actually sound. As soon as Dean ran past the red and blue angels, the Doctor could see them, and they couldn't follow the pair as they made their way to the safety of the headlights' glow.

"How are we gonna last the night?" Dean asked. "My battery won't run forever, and there's no moon out tonight."

"You got a flashlight?"

"Of course. Three or four backups, too. But that doesn't have the kind of power we'd need. They could keep to our blind spots."

"I could boost the power with my sonic screwdriver," the Doctor offered.

For some reason, Dean laughed. "Right. _That's _what that thing is called!" He chuckled drily to himself and kept right on running while the Doctor tried very hard to keep from blinking when he was being jostled with every step.

Finally, they reached the car, and Dean let the Doctor down carefully, slowly, so that one of them could always see the three angels. Panting and wiping his forehead with the back of his jacket sleeve, Dean turned to the Doctor. "So, what do you think? Family of angels?"

"Something like that," the Doctor agreed. He pursed his lips. "I wonder . . . "

"You're going to have to assume I can't read your mind, Doc," Dean said as he went around to the back of the car to retrieve the flashlights.

"I wonder if Donna isn't too far behind us. If that angel was just a child . . . ."

"Teenager, I'd say. Big enough to be near adulthood," Dean pointed out.

"Right, but the _point _is," the Doctor said, more urgently, "he's not as powerful. Maybe, if we're very, very lucky, Donna isn't dead yet."

"What does it matter how far back in time they sent her?" Dean asked. He paused, then said, "I'm turning off the headlights now." As he spoke, he tossed the Doctor a flashlight, and the Doctor could just picture Dean's surprised-but-secretly-pleased face when the Doctor caught it almost without looking.

The difference was immediate. As soon as the headlights went off, the horizon was not clearly visible. Both the Doctor and Dean could hear the sounds somewhere in the distance, the rustling grass, the wind parting as these fast creatures moved past their lines of sight. Even with the flashlights, even with the brighter light the sonic screwdriver provided, they knew they were vulnerable.

The Doctor turned fast to shine his light on a sound at his right, nearly blinding Dean. As Dean blinked and held up his hand against the sudden brightness, he grimaced and muttered, "Right, yeah, that's super helpful, Doc. Let's blind each other so we can't possibly help each other see those things."

The Doctor rolled his eyes and swept his flashlight beam out in front of them. "Can you see anything?"

"Purple spots," Dean replied without a beat.

"I meant any angels."

"I know what you meant." Dean paused, then asked, "So, have you got a plan or what?"

"Sort of," the Doctor said. "It's a variation on the plan I had last time, but it'll be trickier to pull off with three of them and with two of us." Last time, he'd had a four-sided TARDIS to get four different angels looking at the same place. But with Dean and the Doctor as the only source of interest, it would be hard to get them all looking at each other. They could get two of them looking at each other no problem, but three . . . ?

"How come you're so interested in how far back they sent Donna?" Dean asked. And no matter how hard Dean tried to hide it, the Doctor could hear the slight shaking in his voice. He was just asking questions and making jokes to keep his mind off the terror. The Doctor knew that technique well.

"Because, if I'm very, very lucky," the Doctor said, "it means she might still be alive in the present." He allowed himself a sad little grin. "Even if we cross timelines and make the change permanent, maybe we won't find a gravestone. Maybe we'll just find an older Donna."

"I'd like to see that," Dean said with a grin. "Betcha Donna could beat the tar out of any kids who dared to walk on her lawn."

It was the first time since the angels took Donna that the Doctor's chuckle was genuine.


	33. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 6

A/N: And thus ends the super-fast updating. I'll be back again next week, healthy and working and not sitting at home with popcorn and a laptop to write all day :(

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

Dean was finally starting to understand the Doctor's plan.

It had been frustrating at first, because the Doctor hadn't really laid it out for him the way Dean was used to. He just sort of ran with whatever plan he had formed in his head and then expected Dean to follow along. And it wasn't that hard; he'd done that before with Dad on hunts, but it was still frustrating.

But Dean had been doing some figuring in his head, trying to get angles right. If the angels turned to stone in the sight of anything else, what would happen if they got looking at each other?

And then Dean realized that the Doctor was purposefully letting the angels get a little closer, but only from certain angles, and he knew he was right.

"You know," Dean said as he did the math in his head, "you need one person in the middle as the bait."

Dean felt the Doctor stiffen up against him. "I know what you're thinking."

"You said yourself the angels wouldn't want you as much as they'd want me," Dean pointed out. He was already calculating the right place to stand. Really, it was about where the Doctor was, and he needed the Doctor to stand at his nine-o'clock so he could keep an eye on the other two as they approached. Assuming, of course, they came from the right direction. It was a risky plan, alright. Maybe the Doctor wasn't such a wuss after all. "You're lousy bait, then."

"Right, so let's give the angels your life," the Doctor snapped right back.

"Not like I'm gonna do anything important with it," Dean said.

The Doctor stiffened again. "Don't say that."

"You're worse than Bobby," Dean said, wrinkling his nose. Bobby was like that, too, trying to convince Dean to take more of an interest in himself. But didn't he understand what being a hunter was? Being a hunter meant that other people always came first. Always. Their lives came before his because they weren't tainted yet. He'd already been lost to the world of demons and ghosts, so he wasn't as important as they were. They weren't lost yet. And even other hunters came first, really. They had more experience, could do more good.

And Sammy came first most of all. Dad came second.

"No, but really," the Doctor said. "You're brilliant!"

"High school dropout," Dean said without meaning to. It was always his comeback whenever someone commented on his intelligence (usually in the negative), but he forgot that he wasn't going to tell the Doctor he'd given up on his "formal" education entirely. (He wasn't entirely sure why, but he'd wanted the Doctor to think highly of him.) So, he quickly added, "I didn't need it, not really, not with my job."

"Oh, Dean," the Doctor said, and he sounded suddenly old, tired, and sad all at the same time. "You don't really believe all that, do you?"

"Shut up," Dean said. This was getting a little too much like a chick flick for his tastes. The next thing he knew, he'd be getting some kind of cheesy pep talk about how everyone is always worth the effort or some other nonsense about what it took to be valuable. The Doctor was full of crap. "Point is, you said yourself the angels would make a better meal out of me. And this isn't going to work unless we get them all headed in the same direction. Stop me if I'm wrong."

The Doctor didn't say anything.

"That's what I thought," Dean smiled triumphantly.

Again, the Doctor didn't say anything, but Dean knew he'd won the argument when the Doctor shifted so that Dean could stand where he was. After a few tense seconds of silence, the Doctor whispered at last, "Just . . . be careful. I'm not losing any more friends today."

Dean nodded and shined his flashlight on Red, the nearest angel. "You got eyes on the other two?"

"Not yet."

"Maybe they just need a little more prodding," Dean whispered. "You keep an eye on this one. I'm going to set up a perimeter."

"With what?"

Dean just grinned and flipped the flashlight in his hand over before he shoved it in his back pocket.

"You watching my back?" Dean shouted as he made his way slowly around to the other side of Red.

"Yeah."

Dean bent down carefully, slowly, placing the two flashlights on either side of Red so that their beams made a nice little square area Dean could stand in. He sighed, admiring his handiwork, before he looked back up at Red. He was much closer now, almost in the square of light. "Yeah. Figured you might be tempted," Dean muttered, keeping his eyes on the angel. His eyes were starting to hurt, and he tried to resist the urge to rub his eyes. It felt like something was stuck in them. Over his shoulder, he asked, "You sure this'll work?"

"You're the one who volunteered."

"Don't remind me," Dean muttered. He was already regretting it. But he squared his shoulders anyway; no point in showing how scared he was. That was never allowed. He didn't get scared, and even when he did, no one else was allowed to know. "So, I just have to blink, right?"

"Don't keep your eyes closed too long. I might not see everything."

"You just watch my back," Dean said. "You backed up against something so they can't sneak up on you?" He couldn't turn around to see.

"The Impala," the Doctor said. "I'm sitting in the passenger seat so they can't come from underneath, either."

"Smart." Dean liked this new, older Doctor. There was something different about him, like he'd seen more, and he seemed to understand more about Dean's life. It would be nice if they could keep meeting each other when the Doctor was like this.

But then, Dean knew that couldn't be the case. The Doctor would have to meet him again when he was younger, or he wouldn't have the understanding of Dean's future that he did now.

Time travel. Dean held his hand up to the bridge of his nose. This whole thing was giving him a headache.

It took another few minutes (and several deliberately long blinks) before they spotted Blue. She was on the other side of the Impala, which meant the Doctor had his hands full trying to figure out how to direct her to Dean. Dean had to keep his eyes on Red, which meant the kid was still somewhere out there, and they didn't have enough sets of eyes to be on the lookout.

It was a good strategy, though. These things were smarter than some of the other things Dean had hunted. They could strategize, prioritize. Keep the Doctor and Dean separated and busy while the teenager ate his fill of Dean's lifetime.

"What happens if they get to you first?" Dean asked. His eyes were really hurting him now from trying not to blink. And maybe he had some dust in them or something. They felt heavier than usual.

"That would be incredibly inconvenient, since you can't just bring the TARDIS to me, and I'm not seeing any messages from a version of me in the past," the Doctor said.

"Is that what you did last time? Clues and hints and hoping the future will help you out?" Dean asked through gritted teeth. He still couldn't see the kid angel, and his eyes hurt more than anything now. He couldn't help it; he reached up to rub his eye.

He was surprised not only when what looked like stone dust poured from his eye but when he opened them again and the teenage angel was only inches away from him. "Doctor!" he shouted, scrambling backwards. He couldn't see Red, not with his vision obstructed by the huge face in his way, and he'd just spent all that time arranging Red the way he wanted him!

"I'm on it!" the Doctor shouted back. Dean heard heavy breathing and the high-pitched whine of the sonic screwdriver before the flashlights brightened and he spotted Red out of the corner of his eye.

"Okay, there's mine," Dean shouted. "You got yours?"

"Close behind me," the Doctor replied.

Dean was having a hard time keeping his eyes open. It was almost like something inside him was urging him to just give up entirely, to close his eyes and just let them take him. Wouldn't it be easier if he stopped fighting? There was no way he was going to last the night, and besides, he didn't even like the music in the present. He'd be able to live through the best classic rock before it was "classic." He'd carve out his name with hunters before there were as many of them.

Dean frowned. "Doc, you didn't tell me these things could get inside your head."

"How do you mean?"

"I mean I think they're in there, because I'm definitely not the one telling myself to close my eyes," Dean said. "That would have been good to list among the things to look out for."

The Doctor was silent.

Dean knew what that silence meant. The Doctor hadn't known about the angels' powers, either. He puffed out all his breath at once. "Great. We'll cross that bridge when we get to it. I can't see; are you getting Blue any closer? I can only barely see Red, and he keeps moving when I'm focused on the teeth in front of me."

"Can you take a few steps back?"

"You'll watch out for me?"

"Of course."

Dean frowned. He wasn't too happy about this plan, mostly because it required Dean to put so much trust in the Doctor. Sure, Dean liked the guy, but it was a completely different matter to put his life in this Doctor's hands. But he took three steps back anyway. He felt something stone at his back.

"Ah. That's the blue one. Better step around her, just in case," the Doctor said.

Dean kept his gaze trained on the kid angel in front of him as he made his way slowly sideways and then backward until he could see both Blue and the kid in front of him. "Well, we've got two pieces of the puzzle in place."

"Ah," the Doctor said simply.

"That doesn't sound like good news, Doc."

"Yes, well, sorry, I'll fix it."

Dean gritted his teeth. "You'll _what?_"


	34. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 7

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

It had been just a second, but that was enough. He'd been watching the blue angel when Dean stepped just in the Doctor's line of sight. When the Doctor moved to see better, he couldn't see the red angel anymore.

"How are you holding up?" he called to Dean, even though he already knew the answer.

"Oh, you know. My nerves are shot, I've got an angel in my head, and my eyes feel like concrete," Dean said through gritted teeth. "Nothing unusual."

"Don't worry. I said I wouldn't let them take you, and I'm not going to let them."

"It's not me I'm worried about," Dean said darkly. "I've got my eyes on these two, and they're not going anywhere, and you've got a good line of sight on me."

The Doctor understood what Dean didn't say after that. Dean was upset that this was taking so long because it meant, once again, that Dean was the one who couldn't take care of the others. He'd volunteered to be bait, but when he did that, he relinquished control of the hunt and had to give it up to the Doctor. And the Doctor couldn't quite keep in order all the different times he had met Dean and which events happened when, but he didn't remember as many teenage Deans as adult Deans, so this Dean probably didn't have as much confidence in the Doctor's abilities. (He'd been downright rude during the Silurian incident.) And now Dean couldn't help the Doctor watch his back, couldn't be there for support. And that's what Dean was. He was support. He was backup. He was the shoulder to lean on. So this plan, of course, would not sit well with him.

"I'll find the last one. Just make sure you're not blinking."

"You kidding? If I blink, I'm not sure I'll be able to get my eyes back open again," Dean said. His tone was light, but the Doctor could hear the desperation in his voice.

"Dean, duck down and close your eyes," the Doctor said suddenly.

"Have you lost it?" Dean hissed.

"Just duck so I can see the two angels you've got," the Doctor said.

Dean, ever the good soldier, did as he was asked. "Okay, my eyes are closed. How is this being helpful?"

"I'm letting you rest your eyes. I'm going to have to go looking for that red one, and I expect you to still be here when I get back," the Doctor said.

"They want a piece of my sweet timeline, they'll have to do a lot better than dreamtalking and sneaking around," Dean said, grinning.

"That's the spirit," the Doctor said quietly. He paused, then asked, "Think you can open your eyes?"

The silence seemed to stretch on forever before, at last, Dean said, "Okay, eyes open now."

"Can you keep them open?"

"Please," Dean said. It wasn't a plea but a complete dismissal of the Doctor's question.

The Doctor didn't need to hear anything more. He left Dean with the two angels and tromped off after the blue one, running as fast as his trainers would carry him. If the angels were getting inside Dean's head, the Doctor didn't want to leave them alone with each other for longer than absolutely necessary.

Now that he thought about it, his eyes were getting pretty heavy, too. He couldn't hear any voices, not yet, and that was weird, because he was usually a lot more open to psychic links.

The Doctor frowned as a new thought struck him. It might not have anything to do with psychic abilities. What if the angels were doing more than just talking to Dean? He reached up, slowly, to his eyes and rubbed as hard as he could. He could feel something rough and small rubbing around in there, and when he tilted his head, something like sand came out. Rock dust.

"Oh, that's clever," the Doctor muttered, staring at the rock dust in his hand. "If you can't get to the prey just by being fast, make the prey come to you. Convert your victims into angels so they'll be linked to your demands." He sniffed. "Very, very clever."

The Doctor shook off the rock dust and wiped his hand on his trousers before he looked up again to see the blue angel hiding between the trees. "There you are," he said. "What are you running away for?" He raised his eyebrows. "Unless . . . you've figured out what we're up to?"

No response from the angel.

The Doctor ran a hand over his face, sighing in annoyance, before he finally stopped, grinned, and shrugged, "Well, if that's the way you want to play it, I've got another game." Carefully, he reached into his pocket. "I've got something you want."

He slowly pulled out the TARDIS key, careful to keep his gaze on the angel, and then, deliberately, he blinked.

When he opened his eyes again, the angel was closer, its hand outstretched, its gaze almost hungry.

"Atta boy," the Doctor said with a smile. "The TARDIS may be gone, but you could find it with this. And think how much time energy is in there, how much your son could feed off. It'd keep him set for a lifetime, wouldn't it?"

He grinned. "Got your attention now."

He took several quick steps back and away from the angel, careful not to lose his footing. He put the key back in his inside jacket pocket. If nothing else, the key was insurance. Even if the angels got close enough to touch him, they wouldn't send him back in time, not until they had the key.

"Doc!" That was Dean's voice, and he sounded worried.

And, for some reason, the voice was getting closer.

Suddenly, Dean burst over the hill, running full speed. The Doctor half expected to see angel heads appear just behind Dean, but nothing happened. Dean was just running . . . just running.

Dean skirted the angel near the Doctor and came to a stop right by the Doctor. He bent over a little to catch his breath, his forehead crinkled with worry. "They're not with you?" Dean asked.

"What are you talking about?" the Doctor asked.

"The angels. They're not with you?"

"You had two of them with you, didn't you?"

Dean frowned and shook his head, rubbing his eyes as more and more rock dust poured out of them. (They needed to end this soon, or Dean was going to be in worse shape than if they just let the angels send him back in time.) "I couldn't do it, Doc. Sorry. I let them get in my head, and I closed my eyes, just for a second. And by the time I got them back open, they were gone!"

"Gone?" the Doctor repeated. That was definitely fishy. The angels should have jumped on the opportunity to finish Dean off while they could, so why leave their prey behind?

Unless . . . . The Doctor put his hand back in his pocket and felt the key, still safe, still there.

"They're regrouping," the Doctor said as the realization hit him.

"They're what?"

The Doctor pulled the key back out again, keeping his gaze on the angel he could see (though now that the other two were out and about again, there was no telling which direction he was supposed to look). "It's the TARDIS key. The angels know the TARDIS could feed them for the rest of their natural lives."

"And why'd you tell them you had it?"

"I was trying to lure this one," the Doctor said, indicating the angel, "back to where you were."

"And you ended up luring the other two here instead," Dean said, his face lighting up as the understanding hit. "Well, that's great. Now we have to start all over."

"With me as the bait," the Doctor said. He was trying very hard to keep the note of triumph out of his voice.

"Probably better that way," Dean said (to the Doctor's surprise). "I'm no good as bait anymore. We need someone who can keep their eyes open."

The Doctor nodded. He didn't tell Dean that he'd been rubbing some of the rock dust out of his eyes as well or that he'd been feeling a little more sluggish, a little heavier, especially around the eyelids. It wasn't anything he couldn't handle, of course. He'd tested his psyche against the best, and he'd won.

Still, it was disconcerting. He didn't know how to fight this particular type of psychological invasion. He usually liked not knowing; it kept him on his toes. But in this case? He'd have preferred all the answers. Donna was gone and Dean was in danger. He had to keep his head in the game.

"Got any other brilliant ideas to scatter the angels?" Dean asked out of the corner of his mouth. "Now we have no idea where they're hiding."

"We're in the middle of Kansas. It's not like there are that many hiding places."

"Only outside our flashlight beams," Dean pointed out. He pursed his lips. "Hey, does your sonic thing make the batteries last longer? I'm wondering if we can last the night until the sun comes out and gives _us _the advantage."

The Doctor laughed. "It'll help," he said. "It depends on how dead your batteries were before."

"Don't know," Dean shrugged. "I just grabbed the first two I could get my hands on . . . ." He trailed off, staring at something behind the Doctor. "I think I found the kid."

The Doctor didn't turn around; he was still keeping an eye on the blue angel. "Can you see the red one?"

"No," Dean said. Then, even more quietly, "I think the kid's smiling."

"That can't be good."

Dean was quiet again for some time, and the Doctor took advantage of the silence to do some quick configuring in his head. If he could get the blue one on this side and the younger angel there . . . .

"I'm fresh outta plans, Doc."

The Doctor grinned. "Well," he said, dragging out the first word, "if you were a time-eating monster trying to track down an important key to history and a time machine key, what's the first thing you'd do?"

"Come up with a different metaphor so I'm not a key?" Dean said.

"You'd get the two things in the same place," the Doctor said. "Easier to hunt if you round 'em up."

"And that's a good thing?" Dean asked. "If you're right, that just means we played right into their hands."

"Oh," the Doctor said, "I wouldn't say _right _into their hands." He grinned and waved his flashlight in an arc so that the beam caught the red-painted angel as it made its way over the hill. "More like a little to the left."

The deep chuckle behind the Doctor told him Dean understood.


	35. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 8

A/N: I know this is a day later than I usually post. (I try to always post on Tuesdays so the story can move forward.) But I got a letter from a publishing company to "revise and resubmit" my manuscript for a series I'm working on, and that kind of ate all my time!

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernaturalor Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

It was a seamless motion. Dean stepped to his left and turned so he was now facing the climbing red angel. At the same time, the Doctor stepped back and to _his _left so that he had both the kid and Blue in his sights.

"Smart move," Dean muttered. "Can you get yourself in place?"

"Just about," the Doctor said. "You'll have to get the red one closer first."

Dean nodded, grinning. It was the first time since the Doctor had shown up that they had been anywhere close to a lead like this. Time to take advantage of it while they could.

For the first time since he'd started blinking rock dust out of his eyes, he listened to the voices in his head telling him to close his eyes. Not just blink. Just lean back, close his eyes, and let them take him.

He didn't, of course, let them take him, but he kept his eyes closed. One second . . . . Two seconds. . . . Three seconds. . . . He wrenched his eyes open again.

"Hello again," he said out loud.

Red was much closer this time, almost exactly where they needed it to be. The Doctor had his back deliberately turned to Red, so it was Dean's job now to get Red closer, inch by inch.

Of course, now Dean was starting to see the flaw in this plan.

Sure, the Doctor was all pleased to be bait. Something about not being important enough to eat. When this was over, Dean was going to have to talk to the Doctor about the definition of "important." The guy was just about as important as it got.

But as pleased as the Doctor was, he was forgetting one thing: the one who wasn't bait had to carefully time the angels around the bait before they could spring their trap. Ideally, that would involve someone who had full control over their blinking muscles. That definitely wasn't Dean.

"Okay," Dean said through gritted teeth. This shouldn't be so hard, right? He'd done worse things than this, come out of scrapes where he'd been bloody and broken, and all these guys could do was get in his head. He took a deep breath . . . and blinked.

When he managed to get his eyes open again, he was glad he'd had the willpower to do it. Red's hands were so close to the Doctor that the slightest movement would bring the two together.

"That's cutting it a bit fine, don't you think?" the Doctor asked, his eyes wide, trying desperately to fight the urge to look over his shoulder at the hands that had very nearly clamped down on his shoulders.

"Like you're one to talk," Dean said with a smile. He kept his gaze on Red and asked, "You think they're about where we want them?"

"Almost," the Doctor said. He turned his head slightly, just enough for the kid to move in a little closer so that he was in Dean's field of vision. Inches away from the Doctor. They were all so very close now, and if either Dean or the Doctor blinked, it was all over.

That was the problem with this plan. It had to be precise, but it was dangerous because of its precision.

"Ready?" Dean asked.

"As I'll ever be."

"Count of three?"

The Doctor nodded and started the count: "One . . .:

"Two . . . ."

"Three!" the Doctor shouted, flinging himself to the ground. At the same time, Dean closed his eyes.

The silence was deafening. But Dean could still hear the Doctor breathing, which meant he must still be there. That was a good sign, wasn't it?

He could still feel the angels inside him, though. Did that mean it hadn't worked?

He wrenched his eyes open and looked around, hoping he'd find the Doctor alive and well. To his ultimate relief, the Doctor was lying on the floor, looking up at Dean with that same hopeful expression: Did we make it?

Finally, Dean worked up the courage to look at the three angels. And he grinned.

It had been rough trying to get three of them arranged like that, but they managed it. Blue and the kid were facing each other, and Red was close enough to get caught in their lines of vision. They were looking at each other.

"Well," the Doctor said, pulling himself up and away from the small arrangement. "Now all that's left is to make sure no humans come tramping around and get in the way of their lines of sight." For some reason, he took the key out of his pocket, grabbed his sonic screwdriver, and sat down in the middle of the grass, working at something.

Dean sat down as well, leaning back in the grass and closing his eyes. It felt good not trying to keep them open anymore, and when he closed his eyes, the angel in his head was a little less insistent. And he was so tired . . . .

He hadn't meant to doze off, but he was glad he had. Having his eyes closed for so long had mostly silenced the angel in his head, so he was almost disappointed when he had to open his eyes again as the Doctor pressed his shoulder gently with his foot and whispered, "Dean. You awake?"

"Am now." He sat up on his elbows and pushed himself up so that he could see the Doctor better. As soon as his eyes were open, the dull headache started, marking the place the angel had carved out in his mind. But he'd been good at ignoring that so far . . . .

The Doctor held out the TARDIS key. Only this time, it was hanging on a huge circle of string that had been wrapped several times around the Doctor's shoulder. Looked more like climbing rope than string.

"Where did you—"

"Pockets," the Doctor grinned. "They're bigger on the inside."

"Of course they are," Dean groaned. "And what are you planning to do with all that string and a little gold key?"

"Watch," the Doctor said with a lopsided grin.

And as the Doctor turned toward the angels, as Dean could only see his back, Dean heard something. A command.

_Walk in between us._

Okay.

Dean wasn't even really aware he was doing it until he felt a hand on the back of his collar, pulling him back. "What are you doing?" asked the Doctor's voice, but it sounded far away.

Dean gritted his teeth, forcing himself back into reality. "Doc?"

The Doctor now had both hands on Dean—one on each of his shoulders—to hold him in place. "Where do you think you're going?"

"Just watching you do your thing," Dean said. Only he hadn't been doing that, had he? He'd been about to do something else. But it was hard to remember, like trying to hold water in his hands.

"Maybe you should just . . . stay there," the Doctor said carefully. "Just keep an eye on the angels for me, would you?"

"They can't move."

"All the same." The Doctor tilted his head at Dean, almost like he was studying him. "You stay put."

"Like I'm planning on going anywhere," Dean muttered under his breath. But he waited, if only because the Doctor asked him to.

The Doctor moved quickly, unrolling the string and looping it around the angels.

_Step in between us._

Dean moved automatically. It was an order, like the kind Dad gave, and he wasn't about to disobey. He moved forward. He was going to block the angels' view of each other . . . .

But then it was hard to see the angels all of a sudden. Like he knew they were there but he didn't _want _to know they were there.

He put a hand to his forehead and staggered back, trying to force his mind to think straight. It was a little easier now that he couldn't see the path he'd been trying to walk.

Why was he trying to go there, anyway?

Dean didn't realize he was sitting down until he saw the Doctor's outstretched hand in front of him. He reached up to take it and stood up, a little shaky.

This was ridiculous. Why was he having such a hard time? It had only been a little bit of running, but he was used to that sort of thing.

"Dean," the Doctor said. He sounded really far away now. "Can you hear me?"

"Yeah, Doc. What's happening to me?" He tried to ask it like it was just a question, like he was just asking for a status report, but he really couldn't stop the little quiver in his voice. The scared little kid that Dad thought he was.

"I don't know yet," the Doctor said. "But I swear, _I swear _I'm going to figure it out."

Dean frowned. That didn't sound very reassuring. "Maybe we should get you to your TARDIS and you can do some of your time traveler science stuff on me, right?"

The Doctor just laughed—well, it was really more like a nervous chuckle. He was quiet for a while before, finally, he asked, "Is there anything that helps?"

"Sleeping," Dean said. The throbbing and the talking stopped when his eyes were closed.

The Doctor put his hand up to his eyes and rubbed. Dean was surprised to see rock dust come out of the Doctor's eyes as well. They were both infected, then. This was definitely going to be harder than they thought. The Doctor stared long and hard at the dust in his hands and then frowned. "The infection—or whatever it is—entered through our eyes, right?"

"That's where I'm bleeding rock dust, yeah."

"Maybe . . . shutting down the vision centers of the brain . . . ." The Doctor stared at Dean. "Close your eyes, Dean."

"What?"

"Just do it."

Dean closed his eyes. Almost immediately, the throbbing in the back of his head let up. "It helps," he said reluctantly.

"Okay," the Doctor said, carefully, quietly. "Just . . . hang on." Dean felt the rough fabric of a coat underneath his hands and then, to his utter humiliation, he let the Doctor lead him, blindly, back to the Impala.

...

A/N: Yes, I'm aware that the Doctor didn't know this stuff about angels when he was the Eleventh Doctor, so how can he know it as Ten? I'm getting there. Promise.


	36. Book Four: Angels, Chapter 9

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural, Doctor Who, Styx, or any of the related rights.

...

"You are _not _driving."

The Doctor blew out all his breath at once. "We've already had this conversation."

"Yeah, and we're having it again."

"You can't drive if your eyes are closed."

"I'm not a kid anymore, Doc. I think I can handle angel talk for the few minutes it'll take to get out of range."

The Doctor raised one eyebrow. "Out of range of angels who can manipulate the forces of time itself?"

"Yeah."

The Doctor laughed. "Just let me drive. I've got a license."

"You try to show me that psychic paper, and I'll kill you," Dean muttered through clenched teeth. When the Doctor was silent, he chuckled. "I don't get too much spare time, not with taking care of Sammy and hunting and trying to learn as much about monsters as I can, but when I do, you honestly thought I wasn't going to research you?"

The Doctor frowned. Stopped. Turned around. Here it was. The moment he'd been waiting for. "And what have you found out?"

"Well, the jury's out on whether or not you're even human, for one thing," Dean said, and the smug smile was gone. If he'd been able to open his eyes, the Doctor was quite sure Dean would be giving him one of his deep, penetrating glares.

The Doctor's frown got even deeper.

"And hey, if you're Spock, that's fine. Whatever," Dean said (to the Doctor's surprise and relief). "But if you're Arne Darvin . . . ."

"I'll find you some Tribbles you can test on me later," the Doctor said shortly. "After you can see again."

This time, it was Dean's turn to frown. But he covered up for his annoyance with more smart remarks. "The only thing—the _only thing_—you got going for you is the fact that all your records say you travel with humans . . . and you don't kill them. You get 'em killed, sure, but you're not the one that pulls the trigger."

The Doctor froze halfway into the car.

"So I figure you're more Spock. Or maybe Lando. Not quite all good but not bad. That changes, though, and I got lots of intel on things that might kill you. Long falls. Getting shot. You've had plenty of close calls, huh?"

The Doctor tried not to smile at that. Close calls. Yeah. "Just get in the car."

"I get to pick the music, at least, if you're not gonna let me drive."

"You're not falling back asleep?"

"I _don't _sleep when I'm not the one drivin' my baby." Dean turned to the Doctor, his eyes still closed, and gave a half smirk. "Something loud. Maybe some AC/DC. Aerosmith."

The Doctor smiled. At least he wasn't arguing about whether or not the Doctor could drive. He wasn't fighting. So he turned on the radio.

Well, it wasn't AC/DC. But he could see the smile spreading across Dean's face at the guitar chords. The transition from soft to louder. And then the lyrics started in, and the Doctor could see why Dean was grinning.

"A gathering of angels appeared above my head.

They sang to me this song of hope, and this is what they said."

Dean was grinning and mouthing along to the chorus of "Come sail away"s as the Doctor revved the engine.

"You really want to sing about angels right now?" the Doctor teased.

In response, Dean just sang the next verse even louder:

"I thought that they were angels,

But to my surprise,

They climbed aboard their starship

And headed for the skies!"

The Doctor snorted, but there really wasn't much else to do but sing along. So he did.

"Singing: Come sail away.

Come sail away.

Come sail away with me.

Come sail away.

Come sail away.

Come sail away with me!"

Dean leaned back, grinning, in the seat next to the Doctor, and the Doctor couldn't help grinning back, even though Dean couldn't see him. Yes, he definitely missed this version of Dean.

And they had to drive all the way up to Toronto, so Dean did eventually fall asleep. It was hard for him to do anything else when his eyes were closed and the Doctor kept turning down the radio volume by tiny increments every other song.

He'd known, of course, that Dean knew about him. He wasn't sure exactly when Dean had learned that the Doctor wasn't human, but the Doctor had been dreading that encounter. Dean had never been entirely clear on whether the Doctor escaped that particular revelation unscathed.

He still wasn't sure.

But he'd always been on shaky ground with Dean. He tended to show up for the worst of it—or else he was too late for the worst of it.

The Doctor frowned as he pulled up to a red light and looked over at the sleeping teenager in the front seat of the Impala, his head tilted back and his mouth open. He was snoring slightly.

He looked peaceful, and that wasn't a word that the Doctor usually associated with Dean. Sure, he had that tense relaxed look—where even though he was sleeping, his muscles were tensed, ready to spring into action.

But it wasn't as bad as the Doctor had seen it before. Or later, if they were going by Dean's timeline. It wasn't exhaustion- or beer-induced sleep. It wasn't punctuated by bad dreams. Bad memories.

The light turned green, and the Doctor looked away from the boy who would one day be so tired.

…

"Miss?"

Donna groaned. Her head hurt. A lot.

"Miss?"

She was going to say something about being old enough not to be single anymore, but she didn't quite have her mouth back. It still tasted like lead.

"Miss, you can't sleep here." And then she felt the slight poke of a stick in her side.

She sat up quickly, then grabbed her head. The sudden movement made her dizzy. When the world stopped spinning and came into focus, she recognized the policeman's uniform. "Oi," she said, "don't go poking me!"

The policeman stepped back just a bit but quickly recovered. "You can't sleep here, miss."

"And where's here?" Donna asked. Her head still hurt, but she could take in her surroundings now. And this little park looked like it could belong to any other little town in all of anywhere.

"Lawrence, miss. Lawrence Kansas." The policeman tilted his hat at her. "Long night?"

Donna bit back a laugh. If you counted watching a stone angel get slowly closer and closer and then waking up in Middle of Nowhere USA as a long night, then yes. She just shrugged instead and said, "Bit, yeah. You haven't seen my friends, have you? It's just that they're my ride . . . ."

The policeman looked around. "Sorry, miss. No one around here except you. And you can't stay here."

"I got that the first time, thanks," Donna said. She stood up, and this time, she felt a little more sure of herself. "You sure you didn't see them? There's this older bloke, a little older than me, spiky hair, skinny as a pencil, wears a ridiculous suit and sounds like he's talking nonsense?"

The policeman looked like he was ready to report her for being drunk and disorderly, so she decided not to ask about the plaid-wearing hunter with the cute freckles.

"I know, I know. I'm going," Donna muttered. She gathered her jacket up—it had fallen off her shoulder while she slept—and glared at the policeman until she was sure he got the message.

Donna hugged her arms closer to her and tried to think of a way to contact the Doctor. He said that the weeping angels sent you back in time to live to death, so maybe she could send a signal to him in the future?

She wandered just far enough to find a good bench to sit on. She didn't have any money with her, so she couldn't just stop for breakfast. Her stomach protested.

Well, she was good at temping. Maybe she could just hunker down, get something secretarial. Everyone needed secretaries, right? Just something small, something to get her enough money for the days or weeks ahead. The Doctor was never really good at coming on exactly the same day as Donna did. His wasn't an exact science.

"Excuse me."

Donna looked up only to grin when she saw a little boy, maybe three, holding out a piece of candy to her. He had long hair that needed a good trim, but kind eyes, and he looked even a little bit shy. Careful not to scare him, Donna reached out and took the candy with a whispered, "Thank you."

"Are you okay?" asked the little boy. "I saw you sleeping on the bench and thought you looked lost."

Donna smiled. "Hello, sweetheart. What's your name?"

But then the little boy's mother saw him talking to a stranger, and she rushed over. "Dean, what are you doing?" the mother asked.

"She was lost, and I wanted to help!"

Dean.

Donna stared, eyes wide, at the little boy in front of her. She could even sort of see the resemblance now. The freckles, the eyes, the determined little scowl he got when his mother started to pull him away with a whispered, "Don't bother her."

"Oh, I don't mind," Donna said quickly. "He's right, you know. I don't really know where I am. Some friends of mine were out late, and they sort of . . . left me."

Dean's mother kept hold of Dean's hand tightly, but the frown went away the slightest bit, replaced instead by worry.

What cinched it, though, was when Dean looked up at her with his big, green eyes. "Mommy, can we help her?"

The woman sighed. "Would you like a place to clean up? Maybe call your friends?" she asked at last. (Dean's unending tugging on her sleeve probably had something to do with it.)

"That would be lovely, yeah. I don't have a wallet or a phone on me, or I wouldn't want to bother you," Donna said quickly. "I'm Donna, by the way. What's your name?"

Her smile was genuine as she reached out a hand. "Mary. Mary Winchester."


	37. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 1

A/N: I will return you to your regularly scheduled crises and Donna snark and things going wrong, but first...Dean and the Doctor on a road trip. Impossible to resist.

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural, Doctor Who, AC/DC, or any of the related rights to anything.

...

Dean woke up again when the Doctor had a particularly hard stop. He said some very un-Doctorish things as he muttered about people pulling out in front of him.

"You crash my baby, and I'll kill you," Dean said, stretching and yawning.

"_Don't open your eyes_."

He'd nearly forgotten, after that nice, long sleep, that he wasn't supposed to open his eyes. There was still an angel in his head, after all. He frowned, wished he was more . . . useful. "Did you ever get any sleep, then?"

"Didn't need to sleep."

"Uh-huh." Dean craned his neck. He could feel the heat of the sun on his face, and it was higher than midday. "How long was I out?"

"I didn't want to wake you. It seemed like you hadn't had a good night's sleep in—"

"How long?"

The Doctor paused—probably frowning, though Dean couldn't very well tell—before he said, "It's about 3:00 right now."

"That's what, twelve hours?"

"More like ten or eleven," the Doctor said quickly. "You were pretty determined to stay awake, but I suppose that's hard to do when your eyes are closed."

Dean frowned and dug in his pocket for his cell phone with a muttered, "Dad's gonna kill me."

"For what? Sleeping in? I won't tell anyone," the Doctor said, his tone lighthearted. But it was obvious he didn't understand the damage. He must not have ever met Dad.

"I was supposed to check in," Dean said. "He probably thinks he has to come dig me out or something."

"I'm sure your dad—"

Dean held up a hand for silence. "Pull over," he said.

"What?"

"I need to find a phone."

"I have a cell phone . . . well, it was Martha's . . . but nonetheless . . . ."

Dean frowned and wondered, briefly, what had happened to Martha that she would leave something as expensive as a cell phone behind. Dean didn't even have one (though he was saving up to get one for Sammy, once he got better at hustling pool).

"Anyway, you can use it. No sense in stopping. We've got to get to the TARDIS and find out where Donna is _without any detours_ so we can't possibly run into her and cement her timeline."

"No breakfast?"

The Doctor laughed. "We'll drive through. How much cash do you have?"

"It's in the glove compartment."

"Thanks. Here." The Doctor handed Dean the cell phone. It felt much lighter and slimmer than the ones Dean saw at the store.

"What model is this?"

"Oh, it won't be out for about another decade," the Doctor sighed dismissively.

Dean wrinkled his nose. "How do you use it when you can't see _any buttons_?"

"Ah," the Doctor said simply. He took the phone out of Dean's hands, slowed down the car so he wasn't driving distracted (to Dean's relief) and then asked, "What's your dad's number?"

"If he's still at the same motel . . . ." Dean shook his head and gave the Doctor the number. The Doctor was quiet for a while longer and then handed the phone back to him.

He heard the phone ring out before, at last, the manager answered. "Hello?"

"Hi," Dean said. "Is Mister Grant still there? Room 210?"

"They just checked out this morning, sir," the manager said.

Dean swore under his breath. That's what he got for oversleeping. He was always supposed to check in. It wasn't that dad was worried about him or anything. He always knew Dean would get back home okay. Maybe a little battered and bruised, but he wasn't worth worrying over like Sammy was. But he had to check in so he'd know where to find them.

"Did he leave any messages?" Dean asked. The only thing that kept the panic out of his voice was the fact that the Doctor was in the seat next to him. He didn't want to give away how upset he was. But this was a major setback. He'd have to track them down, retrace their footsteps . . . .

"Just a bunch of numbers," the manager said, sounding confused. "He said to give them to his son if he called."

"That's me, yeah," Dean said quickly. "Jackson Grant." The manager tsked and sounded like he needed convincing, so Dean added, "I'm the one that spent all that time on the phone trying to find my little brother."

"And tied up the lines. I remember," the manager said. "He wasn't even really missing, was he?"

Dean frowned. "Just give me the friggin' numbers so I can stop _tying up your lines_." As he said that, he reached over and punched the Doctor in the arm and hissed, "Pull over."

The Impala moved to the side and slowed down, so Dean assumed the Doctor had done what he asked. "Write this down," he hissed through his teeth. He repeated the numbers to the Doctor, and the diligent scribble of a pencil told Dean the Doctor was writing them down.

"Okay, thanks," Dean said quickly and then handed the phone back to the Doctor.

"What was that about, Jackson?" the Doctor asked, only slightly teasing.

Dean laughed dully. "Don't blame me. It was Sammy's turn to pick the alias, and he's reading Civil War history right now. I was all for something a little more Zeppelin . . ."

The Doctor was laughing.

"What?"

"Nothing," the Doctor said. "I just forgot that you two do that."

Dean shook his head. He wasn't supposed to know about his own future, so he decided not to ask. "So, how much longer we got til Toronto?"

"A couple hours."

"That short?"

"We'll cross the border soon."

"We've got to stop before we get there, grab some fake passports or something," Dean said, then paused. "Well, for me, anyway."

"When we stop for food," the Doctor agreed.

"Someplace that has pie," Dean said. "If I'm gonna be stuck like this," he said, motioning to his tightly shut eyes, "I might as well have something nice to eat."

The Doctor laughed again. "I'll see what I can do."

Dean reached over and felt around for the right button to turn on the radio, grinned, and proceeded to air guitar the entire opening to "Back in Black."

The air guitar and singing lasted for all of an hour before the Doctor pulled over and announced that he had found an acceptable place to eat. "You want to come in with me?" he asked tentatively.

"And do what?" Dean asked. Now that he didn't have music to distract him, he was in a surly mood. The Doctor still wouldn't let him open his eyes, and once the Doctor had explained that he was afraid Dean would try to take over the car and get back to the angels and possibly cause a wreck, he had to agree. It wasn't just about being careful with Dean but with the Impala.

"Decide what you want to eat?"

"Just get me a burger and some pie."

"What kind?"

"I don't care. Mix it up." Dean slumped back in his seat. "And don't take too long, okay? I'm ready to find your TARDIS and get somewhere I can open my eyes."

Dean figured he'd be safer in the TARDIS. He didn't know how to fly the thing, so there wasn't much of a chance that the angel in his head would use him to get back to the frozen ones. And since they didn't know what the range of these angels was, it was probably best that they locked themselves in the TARDIS first.

"Lock the door behind me," the Doctor said.

"Like you need to tell me twice," Dean said. But he didn't figure anyone would try anything when he was still sitting inside. They didn't know his eyes weren't opening, and Dean liked to think he was pretty intimidating. Hunting would do that to a person.

The Doctor didn't take long at all, and Dean didn't need to be able to see to notice that the Doctor had't bought much for himself. "You not eating?"

The Doctor chuckled. "I got a milkshake. The sign said they were the best in the area."

Dean shrugged and decided that it was not the time to have the discussion with the Doctor about taking care of himself. If he was an alien, which he almost definitely was, maybe he didn't need to eat that much. Instead, he asked, "Did you grab a passport from the trunk?"

"Yep."

"Which one?"

"The Hamil one."

Dean grinned. "I like that one."

The Doctor just snorted a small laugh through his milkshake and plopped the rest of Dean's food into his lap so he could actually eat it. And for another half an hour, there was silence (except, of course, the radio, which Dean insisted on to keep himself awake, since having his eyes closed wasn't helping him feel any less drowsy).

Finally, after the last of the pie was gone, Dean turned to the Doctor. "Okay, I can only take so much singing to myself."

"Sorry," the Doctor said quickly. "I've been . . . ."

"Distracted, yeah, I figured," Dean said. "And I can't blame you. Donna's gone, and you're trying very hard to get her back safely." He paused, took a breath, and just decided to go for it, "How come you still look human?"

Even without looking, Dean could feel the Doctor stiffen, could hear the steering wheel behind held just a little too tightly. "Are you sure you want to do this right now?"

"I figure it's going to be much more interesting learning about alien planets than singing to the same ten songs," Dean pointed out. "I don't know if you've noticed, but all the stations play the same stuff the further you go."

The silence told Dean that, yes, the Doctor had noticed but decided not to say anything.

"So what are you? Vulcan?" Dean asked. He figured he'd break the ice with something ridiculous.

"Time Lord."

"Is that a species?"

"Yes."

"Huh." Dean frowned. "I always figured that was your title when I was researching."

The Doctor laughed drily.

"And what planet do Time Lords live on?"

"Gallifrey," the Doctor said, but there was a catch in his voice.

Dean bit the corners of his cheek as he tried to decide how far he could pry into the Doctor's life before the Doctor pushed back. But hey, he didn't have anything else to do. And the Doctor's guard was down. And sure, the Doctor was a friend . . . sort of . . . but Dean had to be sure he wasn't a threat.

He figured he'd start with an easy question, then. "How come you're here on Earth and not on Gallifrey?"


	38. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Doctor Who, Supernatural, or any related rights.

...

It had been three months.

Donna sighed as she took off her jacket. The Winchesters had been kind to let her stay in their spare room. She hadn't had any money, after all, and she had to get a job first before she could put any money down on a place of her own.

She had just about enough for a little flat, and she had the paperwork laid out in front of her.

Donna bit the end of her pen. It was a nervous habit she thought she'd gotten rid of, but it was just too _weird _being back to the normal routine of things. The paycheck-to-paycheck life. She thought she'd left that behind when she started traveling with the Doctor.

She was starting to think she'd never get back, that she'd have to wait until she was _old _before she could track him down again.

But at least she wasn't being a huge imposition on the Winchesters. Donna slipped off her shoes under the table and stretched her aching feet. Hours and hours of waiting tables. She'd forgotten her resume was entirely made up of future jobs, so she had to settle for a slightly lower pay grade than secretary.

Oh well. At least the people around here were nice.

There was one in particular named Missouri. She was a little bit weird, lived by herself, and people tended to avoid her. But she instantly liked Donna, and sometimes she hinted that she could tell Donna was a little lost, misplaced, but she didn't ever say too much around other people.

And of course there was Dean. He could tell that Donna was in trouble right from the start, and when he wasn't napping or eating or having little-boy adventures, he was at her side, asking her questions that she couldn't answer.

So as soon as he heard her coming in the door, he must have stopped playing with his cars and building blocks to come visit her. "Hi," he said, almost shy, as always. He was nothing like the charmer she'd met with the Doctor.

"Hi, Dean," Donna said with a smile. She let him climb up on her lap, leaving muddy handprints as he went. "How was your day?"

Dean's entire face lit up with excitement. "Mom's getting bigger and bigger."

Donna nodded. She'd noticed that, too. It had been hardly noticeable when they first met; Mary wasn't far enough along, and she'd been wearing a baggy sweatshirt. But now? "Don't tell her you noticed," Donna said.

"Dad says that, too," Dean nodded earnestly.

"Good for him," Donna said, but now her smile wasn't as broad. She didn't say anything to Dean, of course, but she'd seen the signs. She'd had to point them out to friends of hers right before their dead-beat boyfriends walked out on them. But she didn't say anything to Mary, either. She wasn't sure how much of the Winchesters' lives she should really be tampering with before she created a paradox.

"I think I'm getting a little sister," Dean announced suddenly.

"You do?" Donna asked. "What makes you say that?"

"Because Tommy next door got a little sister," Dean said, as if that was a perfectly reasonable explanation.

Donna just laughed again.

"Dean?" Donna heard Mary's shout from all the way across the house. She heard pattering footsteps, a little slower and heavier than when they first met, before Mary poked her head in Donna's room. "Donna, have you seen . . . ?" Mary's entire frame relaxed when she saw her son sitting on Donna's lap, but she forced her face into proper consternation when she saw the state of him. "Dean!"

"What?" Dean looked genuinely puzzled at the annoyed tone of his mother's voice.

"Did you just roll around in the mud outside? How did you get so dirty?" Mary rushed to grab her son from Donna's lap. "Sorry, Donna." She looked down at the state of Donna's uniform. "Sorry!" she blurted out again.

"It's a Friday," Donna waved her off cheerfully. "I get the weekends off, and I was planning to wash the uniform tomorrow anyway." She didn't really mind. She felt a little less like a lodger and an imposition when she played with Dean.

Mary held Dean carefully over her hip, balancing precariously. Dean planted a big kiss on his mother's cheek, leaving a wet, round, muddy splash on Mary's face. "I was building things, Mom," he said.

Both Mary and Donna grinned at that. It was Dean's special gift, and Mary was always bragging about her son, the genius, who would almost definitely one day go on to design world-famous architecture (or weapons, depending on her mood and how destructive Dean was that day). "What did you build today, sweetheart?" Donna asked.

"I'm gonna make a house!" Dean announced.

"Out of the mud in the backyard?" Mary asked.

Dean frowned. "Houses takes a long time, Mommy."

Mary and Donna both laughed. But then Mary winced, and Donna rushed over to take the muddy Dean out of her arms and help Mary to Donna's bed. "You okay?" Donna asked.

"My sister wants to come today?" Dean asked, clutching Donna's apron straps in his little fingers.

Mary shook her head. "I'm not due for another month." She blew out all her breath at once. "He's just . . . energetic, is all." Mary winced again and sucked air through her teeth.

"My sister is not a he!" Dean insisted.

"Do you want me to get John?" Donna asked at the same time. "He's still at work, I think."

Something dark flashed in Mary's eyes, but it passed just as quickly. Mary shook her head. "I'll be fine."

"You sure?"

Mary nodded.

"At least let me help. I'll put something on for dinner and get this one," Donna paused, bouncing Dean playfully, "cleaned up."

Mary leaned back against the headboard of Donna's bed. "You really don't have to."

"And you didn't have to take me in," Donna said firmly. "Let me help."

Mary just leaned back, closed her eyes, and nodded.

Donna left Mary behind on her bed, clutching Dean to her as she climbed up the stairs. She'd done this a few times now, taken care of Dean. It was weird meeting him as a teenager and then seeing him streaking across the house in all his three-year-old glory as his mother chased him down with a towel and the clothes he'd left behind.

It was a very, _very _good thing Dean didn't remember any of this. He must not have been old enough. But she knew she had to get out of there if it was going to stay that way.

She was saving up to move. She had to get out of this town before she started creating memories Dean didn't have. She might not have been traveling with the Doctor for very long, but she knew enough to understand the basic rules.

"Donna?" Dean asked suddenly, looking up at her with his big, green eyes.

"Uh huh?"

"How come you always look so sad?"

Donna blinked, trying to come up with an answer.

Dean took advantage of her silence. "Mommy says you lost a person."

"I did," Donna said. "Sort of."

Dean wrinkled up his nose. "How do you sort of lose somebody?"

Donna laughed. "It's a long story. Now go get your submarine so you can play with it after you get washed up."

Dean nodded as Donna set him down and ran off toward his room, past the half-finished nursery.

(Donna didn't know why, but seeing the nursery made her sad.)

When he came back, Dean was clutching his submarine, three race cars, and several handfuls of LEGOs tucked into his pockets. "I'm ready!" he announced.

Donna just laughed and picked him up under the arms. When she left, she was definitely going to miss this kid.

...

"Okay, you can open your eyes now."

The Doctor had a tight grip on Dean's shoulders, steering him carefully until he was through the doors of the TARDIS. But now that the doors were tightly closed, he thought it might be safe for Dean.

Dean opened his eyes and sighed with pleasure as he was finally able to see again. "You know, I missed this old thing," he said.

The Doctor grinned. That was his favorite part about traveling with humans; the wonder of the TARDIS never seemed to leave them, no matter how many times they had been inside.

It had been a long drive after the Canadian border. Lots to talk about. And think about. Dean had taken it pretty well; he had already known a few of the rumors about the Doctor, so a lot of their discussion was simply a confirmation of what Dean already knew. But the whole Time Lord thing was still difficult for him to wrap his head around.

Of course, the Doctor had managed to escape too much of an interrogation after the Canadian border. After all, fake IDs and passports and the arsenal in the trunk that somehow was hidden from the border patrol . . . the Doctor had questions, too, and then Dean was on the offensive.

Not that the Doctor didn't know the answers already, mind. He just didn't like the way the conversation had been going. About Gallifrey. And where the other Gallifreyans were.

The Doctor shook his head to clear his thoughts and looked up to see Dean rubbing his eyes again. "Are they still talking to you?" he asked quietly.

"A little," Dean admitted. "But it's like I know they're talking to me, but I don't _have _to listen to them. Not if I concentrate hard enough." The look on Dean's face told the Doctor that he was struggling a little more than he let on, but the Doctor knew from experience not to push him too hard.

"Well then," the Doctor said, clapping his hands together and rubbing them excitedly. "Let's find out where the angels sent Donna and see if we can't rescue her." He pushed the buttons and pulled the requisite levers with a little more flair and umph than was probably necessary (he was showing off again, not that he minded or cared) and then, with a flick of his wrist, had the scanner up and running numbers.

"That would've been handy when Sammy ran away," Dean said sullenly. "A person detector."

The Doctor frowned but decided not to say anything, especially because the scanner dinged its completion of all its calculations. He turned to the scanner and gave Dean a lopsided grin. "We're in luck," he said. "She hasn't gone too far. Only about fourteen years into your past and a few miles off from where we left her. The TARDIS pinpointed just where she landed." He turned the scanner to show his friend.

Instead of grinning, as the Doctor had expected, Dean instead turned an ashy white.

"What?" the Doctor asked.

Dean just turned an even lighter white as he stared at what the scanner said: Lawrence, Kansas. January 2, 1983.


	39. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 3

A/N: My husband and I were in a pretty serious four-wheeling accident just yesterday, so now we're both bed-ridden for at least today and tomorrow. So there may be extra chapters this week as I have nothing else to do but sleep, Netflix, and writing :)

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who or any of the related rights.

...

Dean sat down shakily in the yellow seat, the one that was old and falling apart and had bits missing from the middle.

Why?

He didn't realize he had his head in his hands until the Doctor was right there in front of him, pulling his hands apart with the _look _on his face.

"Dean? You okay?"

"Yeah."

"Liar."

Dean tried to grin at that.

"You could stay here. In the TARDIS. If you want."

Dean glared at him. "Yeah right. You'd screw it up without me."

"Then you're coming?" The Doctor grinned broadly, the stupid grin that usually meant they were about to do something dangerous.

Dean frowned almost as soon as the Doctor turned his back. He _definitely _wasn't going to talk to the Doctor about it. Maybe they could manage not to run into Mom or Dad or even himself.

That was a thought. What would it do to time and space if he ran into himself?

Maybe he should tell the Doctor.

But not everything. No, he couldn't tell the Doctor everything. Not about Mom. And the Thing that killed her. Not about how everything changed that year. In November.

But it was far enough out. Eight months. They might not even run into the Thing.

Dean took a deep breath. Why was he so scared? It was just Lawrence. It was no big deal, right? Just Lawrence.

Except he had promised himself that he would never come back there. Not ever.

Dean shook his head, took a deep breath, and ran right out the doors after the Doctor, his eyes screwed tightly shut, even tighter than when he had been trying to keep out the angels in his head. Because this time he was trying to keep out something so much worse.

"Well, this is a nice place," Dean heard the Doctor say. So he opened his eyes.

It wasn't quite how he remembered it. Somehow, everything was . . . brighter in his memories. More colorful. More welcoming. Or maybe he was just remembering a time in Lawrence when it wasn't raining.

Dean scowled and pulled the leather jacket up over his head. "You sure we landed in the right place and time? _Absolutely sure_?"

"Well, we might be off a bit."

"This is Lawrence, though. I'm asking if we're in the right time."

The Doctor paused, tilted his head, and turned back to Dean. "How did you know that?"

"What?"

"When you said, just now, that we were in Lawrence," the Doctor said, "you sounded so very certain. How could you be?"

Dean felt like he had nearly swallowed his tongue. He even took a step back before he caught himself and shook his head. "Driven through here before. No big deal. One more town on the list of places I've had to go through. Monsters I've . . . ."

Why did his mouth feel so dry all of a sudden?

He waved his hand. "It doesn't matter. I've just been here before. Only I . . . I had a question."

The Doctor raised his eyebrows, and Dean knew why. He knew that he wasn't usually like this. Slow to get the words out, careful what he said, thinking through every sentence. But he had to be careful. "Well, spit it out," the Doctor said.

"What happens . . . if I meet myself?" Dean asked.

"That's why you were asking what time we landed here? Because you've been here before?"

Dean nodded.

The Doctor beamed and slapped him on the back. "Don't worry about that. The worst margin of error I'd say is a few months, give or take. Any my TARDIS is usually more dependent than that." The Doctor puffed his chest out importantly, but Dean wasn't falling for it.

He didn't necessarily care that the Doctor was now more interested than ever in what was going on. He just knew that he had to get to the nearest newspaper stand. He had to look at the date.

He remembered one outside the candy store, and that was about the only place he remembered from growing up because Dad took him there sometimes when Dean was being particularly hard to take care of and Mom had asked Dad to watch him. Dad would always get a newspaper and give Dean one dollar to spend on whatever he wanted.

It was right around the corner . . . .

He very nearly ran into her (he managed to avoid the stroller, at least). He pulled up just short, muttering his apologies, not as much embarrassed as he was frustrated with himself for not looking where he was going. "Sorry, miss."

"That's okay," she said. She had been bending over to pick up the grocery bag he had knocked out of her hands, so he hadn't seen her face, but as soon as he heard her voice, he knew.

Mom.

He froze.

This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. This shouldn't be happening.

Aw, crap.

It was, of course, at that moment that the Doctor decided to stroll right into this mess of a situation. He walked right up, saw the groceries on the ground and the stunned Dean uncharacteristically letting the woman pick them up by herself, and jumped in without a backward glance. "Here, let me help you with that."

"Thanks," Mom said quietly. She had been holding some kind of baby toy in her right hand, and she let it fall into the stroller, and Dean recognized the contented gurgle.

Sammy.

Aw, crap. Not good.

Dean tried to think of something to say, but all he could do was stare stupidly at Mom and think about how beautiful she was. She seemed distracted, though. Tired. He wanted to hug her, but he was still just a stranger to her. So, instead, he just looked down at Sammy and muttered something that he hoped actually came out as, "He's a good-looking kid."

Mom gathered herself to her feet and smiled her tired smile at him. "Thank you."

"How old is he?"

"Just two and a half months," Mom said, and her smile seemed much less tired now. She beamed down at little Sammy, and he looked just so pleased to see Mom's face that Dean felt his throat constrict.

"Two months. Good." Dean said, then quickly said, "I mean, he's pretty big for that young."

"That's my Sammy," Mom said.

And when she looked at Sammy that way, well, Dean just about lost it. As it was, he blurted out, "You know, he seems like a special kid. You should do something for, I don't know, his six month birthday. Go somewhere. Celebrate, maybe."

Mom just raised her eyebrows at him like he'd sprouted green ears.

The Doctor was looking at him that way, too.

"Right. Ignore me. I'm just . . . going to get a newspaper," Dean said, stepping quickly around the corner and grabbing the nearest bench for support when his knees nearly buckled underneath him as soon as he was out of Mom's sight.

Okay. Breathe. Stop. Think. Breathe some more.

Dean put his head between his knees. Why was he reacting this way? His hands were sweaty; he was all shaken up. Maybe because he just wanted to run to Mom and tell her not to be anywhere in the country on November 2. Or maybe he just wanted to run to Mom and hug her and hug her and never let go. To tell her who he was and go home with her, eat one of her homemade sandwiches. Or her pie. Maybe both.

But he couldn't.

He grabbed the newspaper to check out the date. July 16. He let out all the breath he hadn't realized he had been holding. Somehow, it helped seeing the date on a piece of paper.

He heard the Doctor coming around the corner (the squeaky tennis shoes gave him away) and quickly pretended to be looking over the newspaper for clues to where they were.

"So," the Doctor said, settling down next to him on the park bench with his hands folded in his lap. "Who was she?"

"I ran into her," Dean shrugged casually.

"And then looked like you'd seen a ghost," the Doctor pointed out. "Is she?"

"Is she what?"

"A ghost?"

"_No!_" Oops. That came out a little too forcefully. Time to backtrack. "She's . . . she's . . . ." Dean groaned. The only safe way was telling the truth, he knew. But he was _not _telling the whole story. "She's my mom."

"Oh," the Doctor said simply. But the way he said it, so carefully—it was almost like he _knew_.

Huh. Dean's future self must have really trusted the Doctor for him to find out something like that. Good to know.

"And the baby?" the Doctor asked when he had recovered.

"Not me. That's Sammy. I guess I'm somewhere at home with Dad or a babysitter or something," Dean said. He blew out all his breath at once. "That's weird to think about."

"Do you want to head back to the TARDIS? I'm sure I can track Donna down just fine on my own."

Dean glared at the Doctor, and the Doctor immediately held up his hands to show that it was just a suggestion.

….

From her position as watch guard over the Winchester house, Deborah could see the Time Lord and his companion. She recognized him, of course. Most angels had at least heard of him, since they were supposed to keep an eye out for anything that could damage humanity. They had at first been worried about the danger the Doctor brought with him, but now they tolerated him.

But not this time.

This time the danger was immense. This time, he could potentially damage a plan thousands of years in the making. This time, Deborah knew she had to get him out of there before he or the future Winchester changed the course of events.

The Time Lord might change things on accident, but the Winchester? He knew what happened here shortly, and he might change the timelines on purpose.

She wasn't sure why, but she had her orders. In a few months, Mary Winchester would die. And that couldn't change.

She sighed. She might have to get permission to find a vessel. That would make it easier to stop these two men out of time.


	40. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 4

A/N: Thanks for all the notes of concern! I had a slight concussion, so they told me not to do anything too thinky like reading or writing (sad!), but I'm doing much better now yay! My husband's okay, too. He's still kinda sore like I am though. No more four-wheeling for a while, I think ;)

Disclaimer: I don't own any of the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

It shouldn't be too difficult to find Donna in this small town. After all, not many people came and went. They all seemed to know each other; that much was obvious from the prolonged stares that he and Dean, as strangers to the town, were amassing. It would be simply a matter of asking around for the new people without seeming too suspicious.

Dean was avoiding all the stares as best he could by keeping his head down and the collars of his leather jacket turned up. "Let's just find Donna and get out of here," Dean muttered through clenched teeth, his fists in little balls.

The Doctor just smiled softly. He couldn't blame Dean for being on edge. Sam had told him the story of what happened to his family (or, at least, what little Sam knew of the story) when he was older, and it definitely wasn't something anyone should have to face: the prospect of changing an entire timeline to save his mother. Dean would do it, too.

And as he'd already learned long ago, there's wasn't a little boy alive who wouldn't tear the world apart to find his mummy.

Sometimes very literally.

So the Doctor wasn't about to let Dean out of his sight.

Apparently, Dean had noticed, too, because he turned to the Doctor with a scowl on his face. "You're not my babysitter," he pointed out. "We'll cover more ground if we split up."

The Doctor decided it would be much less complicated if he skirted the issue of Dean's mother entirely, so he raised his eyebrow at Dean in mock shock. "You're not feeling any different? No sudden urges to run back to that house and warn the angels of their impending doom?"

In answer, Dean just rubbed absently at his eyes. When he stopped rubbing, there was not nearly as much rock dust on his hands as there had been before (which the Doctor took to be a good sign), and he looked up at the Doctor with a shrug. "Told you we could get out of their range."

"All the same, I don't think it's a good idea for you to go anywhere alone," the Doctor said. "I've never encountered this particular side effect about angels, and I don't know what it'll do to you."

Dean frowned but did not argue further.

When Dean turned his back, the Doctor grinned at his success. One crisis averted, then, and without any painful arguments. Now to find Donna before she met the Winchesters and created a nice little paradox. That could be difficult. She was particularly good at finding trouble.

...

"Finally done," Donna announced to no one in particular, grinning with her arms thrown out wide.

She didn't have very much to her name, so it really hadn't taken very long to move herself into the ramshackle apartment that was finally all her own. But she had worked _hard _for that money, and she was proud nonetheless. If only the Doctor could have seen her now. Supertemp, that's what she was. She'd even been promoted to day shift manager! She was putting enough away every week that she had even started looking in different cities for jobs she could transfer to. She'd left her resume at a few places, but nothing yet.

Donna slumped down in the couch she'd bought at a yard sale. It wasn't as stiff as the captain's seat in the TARDIS, but then again, it wasn't as comfortable as the couch at her old place. It was somewhere in between.

She pulled the little piece of paper out of her pocket and unfolded it carefully so that she didn't smudge anything with her sweaty fingers. She knew exactly who the letter was from; that much was obvious from the messy, childish handwriting on the address.

In blocky, crayon-ed handwriting, she saw the carefully traced letters: "Mis Dona, I mis yu. Plees cum eet dinr heer sun." Underneath the short message was a crayon drawing of two stick figures, one very short with a yellow line across his head for hair, and one very tall with lots of red lines for Donna's hair.

"Miss you, too, Dean," Donna said. In more ways than one.

Donna pulled the blinds shut in her apartment after one last look around the block. She always did that, always checked just in case there was a tall bloke with a freckled teenager by his side.

She'd held onto hope for the first three months or so. But after six months, she'd really started to doubt. Now, she only checked outside the window because it was part of her nightly routine.

This was the story of her life, wasn't it? Finding the Doctor and then losing him again and going back to a normal life.

When she'd first met him, it had been a storm, a whirlwind. She hadn't really known what to do except keep hold of his hand and keep running. And it was all so absurd, wasn't it? Aliens and spaceships and time travel and giant spiders! Who could blame her for being absolutely terrified?

And then he was gone. And how was she supposed to track down a time-traveling alien in a blue box? It wasn't like she could just file a missing persons report. So she tried to travel on her own, but it really wasn't the same. And then she was back to the same old life, playing at adventures but never really finding them.

And then he was back, like fate or destiny or something else that Donna didn't believe in. And she didn't question it this time. She just jumped on board the TARDIS and grinned at his little "Alons-y!" and his Martian-y ridiculousness.

Now look at her. Back to normality. She couldn't even really try to solve mysteries to look for him, not without a place to stay like her mother's, and not without the mass of ID cards she had so carefully collected.

Donna sighed and folded the letter away. If she dwelt on the past for too long, she knew she'd get depressed. So she pushed it out of her mind.

She had just stepped out of a nice, long, hot shower to get all the sweat and grease out of her hair when she heard a knock at the front door. Donna rolled her eyes. Of course someone had stopped by while she was wearing nothing but a bathrobe! Typical.

She threw open the door, the explosion of annoyance right at the tip of her tongue, but her blustering stopped before it really had time to get boiling.

Right there in front of her was a young woman, hardly older than Dean was the last time Donna had seen him with the Doctor, holding up a badly torn shirt and wiping her face. Her mascara had smeared all the way down her face, and she was nursing her shoulder. "Umm," she said, suddenly looking up to see that someone had answered the door. "Sorry," she said quickly. "I know it's late . . . ."

"Come in," Donna said quickly. She glanced down either side of the hallway to make sure that whoever had done this to the poor woman hadn't followed her before she closed the door and locked it.

The woman sat down on Donna's old couch. "I'm sorry. You're in your bathrobe . . . "

"Don't worry about it, sweetheart," Donna said cheerfully, wrapping the robe even tighter around her shoulders. "Are _you _okay?"

Her lower lip quivered, and the young woman burst into tears.

Donna's first instinct was to rush over and put her arms around the girl, but from the way she was crying and the way she looked . . . . Donna wasn't sure she'd let her touch her.

"You can stay here for the night if you like," Donna offered. "My neighbor's a good bloke. Ex-marine. He won't let anybody hurt you." She knelt down in front of the crying girl and gently pried her hands from her face. "There, now. I promise I won't let anything happen to you."

Blinking back the tears, the girl smiled at Donna and whispered a barely audible, "Thank you."

Donna smiled and sat back on her heels. "Now, what's your name? I haven't seen you around here before, and that's saying something."

"I'm new," the girl sniffed. "My . . . my boyfriend and I just moved in down the hall."

"Is he the one chasing you? Your boyfriend?" Donna asked carefully.

The girl nodded and then choked out another sob. "I don't know what came over him! He's never been like this before. And then the lights got all . . . flickery. And I felt really cold, you know?"

Donna frowned. This was definitely not the usual case of domestic abuse. Not that any case was usual. "Do you want me to call the police? Maybe they can drop in on him and—"

"Oh, please don't," the girl said quickly. "I don't think they can help. Not with this sort of thing, anyway."

Donna was starting to think she understood. This sounded like what the Doctor was saying Dean did—hunting monsters and ghosts and things like that.

Donna sighed. She had actually signed up to be part of this world. She'd thought it would be more aliens and less Ghostbusters, but she had actually chosen the adventure and danger. She couldn't back away from it now just because there was some new aspect she hadn't considered before.

"You're safe now, okay?"

The girl took a deep breath. "Okay."

"I'm Donna, by the way."

The girl smiled pitifully. "My name's Deborah."


	41. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 5

A/N: Yes, I know there are way too many D-names in this story. Deborah, Doctor, Donna, Dean. I didn't do it on purpose! :P

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, Supernatural, or any of the related rights to anything.

...

So far, the plan was going swimmingly.

Deborah leaned back against the couch, stretching out her new vessel and examining the long, pretty fingers. It hadn't been hard to convince the girl to let her in. The bruised face, the ripped shirt? That wasn't an act. She'd readily agreed, even if it wasn't for the best of reasons.

Deborah hadn't had the chance to smite somebody in a long time.

She allowed her lips to curl up in a small smile. Some of her brothers and sisters weren't fans of the whole smiting thing, but Deborah definitely missed the days when angels had been much more . . . active in human history.

Maybe that's why she'd asked for this assignment. Watching over the Winchester boys. John, Dean, and now Sam. She didn't exactly know why they were special, but at least it was better than just sitting around and watching these idiot humans squander the lives her Father had given them.

She really wasn't even supposed to be interfering with anything. Couldn't even stop them from dying. But Heaven wanted to keep an eye on them, and that's what she was doing.

But with the Doctor around, she was taking matters into her own hands. Because all the plans in Heaven and Earth couldn't contain that man when he was determined to cause untold damage. And she was pretty sure Heaven hadn't planned for him.

Well, she hadn't communed with Heaven, but she had a hunch.

Okay, so she really just wanted an excuse for some action.

Deborah heard Donna coming back from the bedroom (she had wanted to change into her own clothes before she invited Deborah back to find some that fit her). She went right back into character, with her hands over her face, dabbing away the last of her imaginary tears. The acting wasn't the hard part, after all. The hard part was not letting her healing powers take over and get rid of the bruises. It would give away her cover.

"So your boyfriend just suddenly changed everything about his personality? Just out of the blue?" Donna asked, offering Deborah a tentative hand to help her off the couch.

"He's always been so good to me," Deborah said, sniffing as hard as she could for effect, trying to hide the smile that threatened to give her away. Give the girl a mystery and she was just jumping to fall into Deborah's embrace.

This was going to be easier than she thought.

"Did you notice anything before it happened? Any strange noises, maybe smells or sounds?" Donna asked.

Deborah buried her face in her hands to stop the smile that was going to come no matter what she did. She was really going to have to work on controlling her vessel's emotional outlets. She wasn't really . . . emotional . . . that was for humans. But she _appreciated _humor and enjoyment. But a grudging respect or growing irony was apparently cause for smiling when it came to human faces. Interesting. But she couldn't help it. Donna really could have been a fantastic hunter in another life.

"Well, the power went out . . . ." And then Deborah let herself dissolve into tears again.

Through the cracks in her fingers, Deborah could see Donna bite her lip. And with her angelic hearing, she could hear the muttered, "Wish Dean was here."

...

Dean sighed and leaned against the back of the booth, his eyes closed. He wouldn't admit it with the Doctor around, but it felt better to have his eyes closed.

He still had a dull headache, a ringing in the back of his head and in his ears. And he wasn't really surprised. The angels, as far as he could tell, were creatures of time energy, and they wouldn't be daunted by just a skip in time. It just took a little more effort to reach him here, and they were a bit preoccupied at the moment with the whole looking at each other thing.

Dean was willing to bet that the Doctor was struggling, too. He could see it, in the unguarded moments, the times when he thought no one was looking and he would pinch the bridge of his nose too sharply for it to be "just thinking" or whatever other ridiculous excuse the Doctor came up with. Dean recognized the symptoms.

He heard the scuffle of tennis shoes on tile as the Doctor turned, and Dean forced his eyes back open and plastered a smile on. "What's up, Doc?" he asked, a crooked grin tugging at the corners of his mouth.

The Doctor frowned. "Don't call me that."

"Losing battle."

"Don't I know it." And there was something like a smile in the way the Doctor tilted his head at Dean.

Dean straightened up his jacket and pulled the flaps a little higher. The jacket was still crisp enough to do that, but he knew he had to keep ironing the edges if he wanted to make this thing last. Couldn't afford another jacket, not the way Sammy was going through clothes. Growth spurt. Besides, he was fine with Dad's hand-me-downs. Warmer anyway.

Right.

"The manager says Donna's been working here for months. Everybody seems to like her. A little bossy, though," the Doctor said with a secret grin. "I suppose they're starting to rue the day they promoted her to manager."

Dean winced, too. He hadn't seen much of Donna, but what he had seen was a little bit rash and abrasive. (He kind of liked it.) And maybe just a tiny bit like Sammy. Shouting at what they don't have a choice in, the things they couldn't control.

"You get an address?"

"Not directly," the Doctor said. "They know she lives in the apartment complex across the way, but no one's sure which room it is. Second floor was really the only thing I could get, and even that's up in the air." The Doctor laughed without any trace of a smile. "Seems she kept talking about getting out of town, so she didn't have many people over."

Dean frowned, let the sting of disappointment settle in his stomach. One more person he could have helped, one more "too late." "Looks like the TARDIS needs some touching up."

Something flashed in the Doctor's eyes, and Dean blinked back surprise as the Doctor turned and, in a quiet but still commanding voice, said, "She's the best ship in the universe." And then that something was gone before Dean could give it a name, and the Doctor gave him that signature smile again. "Of course, we've all got our quirks. So, what do you say? Let's hop across the road and give Donna a call? She just got off her shift, so she should be home watching telly by now, I'm willing to bet."

Dean blinked. Being friends with the Doctor was like getting emotional whiplash. "Sure," was all he could think to say.

And that was it. They were across the street in a heartbeat, with the Doctor pounding on every door and brandishing his psychic paper. "Sorry, ma'am, just stopping in for a routine inspection," he said easily. "Calling for any maintenance issues."

The old woman sized up the Doctor with just a glance, and then let loose a barrage of complaints, so much that the Doctor seemed to be reeling as he tried to figure out whether to just bolt or to keep up his pretenses. He turned back to Dean with this _look _in his eyes, and Dean couldn't help the chuckle that rose in his throat.

Luckily, he had been standing behind the Doctor when they were introduced to this old woman with her endless list of complaints ("and when I leave the air conditioning on for too long, the ceiling around it starts to leak! And when are we going to do something about the insulation!"), so he was able to back out of the doorway quietly enough. He crept past the door and went on to the next apartment, figuring the Doctor would catch up to him when he got the chance.

His approach was a lot less flashy. It helped that he was still a teenager, and even though he usually hated that people thought he was nothing more than a kid, it definitely came in handy when he arranged his face just right, all excited and glowing eyes, and then looked disappointed when the door opened. "Wrong apartment number, sorry," he would mutter and look at the floor. He was hoping people would just assume he was some poor sucker being stood up for a date or something like that. For the most part, it worked. A couple awkward questions and pitying stares, sure, but nothing too soul-crushing.

He was almost at the other end of the hallway before he heard it. Muffled crying. The kind of terrified crying that Dean was supposed to stop from happening to anyone else ever again.

He stood there in the middle of the hallway, trying to fight his hunting instincts. He had a case already. Donna's case. And his. And the Doctor's, really.

"Aw, crap," he muttered as he skipped a couple doorways and went right to the source of the crying. He straightened up, got rid of the puppy-dog eyes and the teenage pout, and went full hunter-mode. Pounding on the door, he shouted, "Hey, is everything okay in there?"

He heard the sound of scuffled footsteps and shuffling chairs before the door flung open and, before he could react, Donna had reached out to slap him right across the face.


	42. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 6

A/N: Staying in for ice cream, Thai food, Doctor Who, and games :)

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

The _nerve _of some people. The cheek. The gall!

Donna stood there fuming for a few seconds more, allowing the full force of her anger to seep into every pore on that freckled boy's face.

And then she hugged him.

She hugged him so tight that she could feel him squirming uncomfortably, but she didn't care. She hugged him in the affectionate way that only longtime friends hugged, even though she knew he didn't remember anything about her. She hugged him like he was her last lifeline.

When she finally released him, Dean had turned a pretty shade of red, though whether that was from embarrassment or oxygen deprivation was hard to tell. He coughed lightly and tugged his sleeve where she had crumpled it. "Nice to see you too," he said in barely more than a mutter, but she could tell he was grinning.

"You took your sweet time getting here!" Donna said. "I was just about to go flat shopping in Topeka!" She pulled a face. Good thing she'd been saved from_ that_.

"Just be glad we weren't a few more months late," Dean said, and his tone was so dark that Donna knew better than to ask. After all, she was living in _his _memories, and a little boy like the Dean who played Batman in the backyard didn't become a soldier-hunter for no reason.

Donna suddenly had the urge to run back to the Winchesters' and take them all in the TARDIS with her. Dean's eyes were that broken.

There was no reason on God's green earth for him to look like that. None at all.

She pulled herself out of the past (both her past and Dean's) and straightened her shoulders. Back to the present. "Still, I have to admit, you've got good timing," she said, motioning toward her new house guest.

Deborah had been watching this whole exchange in muted silence, but now that Donna had turned to get a really good look at her, she could hardly mistake the surprise and . . . was it terror? It wasn't terror. What was it?

"Are you okay?" Dean asked, and without being told, Donna knew that he had just switched from being an old friend to being a seasoned hunter, like pressing a button. Dean knelt down in front of Deborah, his expression open and his body language as far from threatening (while still being protective) as he could get. But he was still searching, still taking in every detail about Deborah, still mentally calculating all the different things that could possibly be wrong and a hundred different ways to help.

She could see all that just in the way he stood.

As she stared at Dean, something seemed to click behind Deborah's eyes, and the waterworks turned back on. "No," she managed between muffled sobs. "No, I'm not okay."

And this was the first time, Donna realized, that Deborah had meant a single word she said.

...

The Doctor heard the shouting and recognized the voice, but it still took him a while to extricate himself from the clutches of the old woman who was determined to list every fault she had ever found in the place. She was just going on about the ant problem she had because her neighbors downstairs never did their washing up when the Doctor interrupted with what he hoped was his most winning smile. "Sorry, gotta dash. It's been lovely talking to you, really."

"But I haven't . . . !"

Whatever she hadn't was never really told to the Doctor, because he put his finger to his lips, poured in a little psychic juice, and shushed.

He hadn't done that in a while. Only really worked on lower intelligence species, and this woman seemed sharp enough that it wouldn't work. Guess he was wrong.

Once the door was safely shut behind him, he bounded down the hallway with his longest strides, flying toward the open door he knew had to be Donna. Both his hearts were racing; he was more than pleased to find her okay and before they had a chance to make any timelines permanent. This was brilliant. _She _was brilliant. He flew into the doorway . . . .

He had to physically stop himself before he flung himself at Donna. It wouldn't be appropriate, not with Dean kneeling down next to a woman crying into her hands.

Somehow, this was not how he had pictured the reunion with his best mate.

"What . . . what . . . ?" He turned to Donna, the question in his eyes if not on his lips.

"She just showed up at my door a bit before you two did," Donna said, her eyes full of sympathy but also full of something else the Doctor couldn't quite place yet.

"What happened?"

"Not sure," Donna said. She was speaking through the corner of her mouth and was uncharacteristically subtle. The Doctor couldn't tell if that was just from so long spent traipsing through the past and tiptoeing around temporal landmines or if something was really wrong, so he leaned in closer.

"Your detective bells ringing?" he asked in a low whisper.

Donna turned to him, her eyes narrowed, but not in annoyance as usual. This time in thought. "You know how sometimes," she said, "when people are lying to you, you believe them?"

"That would be the nature of lying, yes," the Doctor cut in.

"I know that, dumbo," Donna said with a smile, and that was much more like the Donna he adored. "I just mean, you know how you believe them, and then you here them tell the truth, and it's like everything else suddenly sounds so stupid you can't believe you ever listened?"

The Doctor frowned and hoped, for one insane second, that she wasn't talking about him.

But then Donna turned her gaze back to the woman who was now sniffing back the last of her tears. "I wanted to help her," Donna said quietly. "And now I think she's got something else in mind."

"My kind of something else or Dean's kind?" the Doctor asked. He knew better than to question Donna's judgment. Ask questions later, when she wasn't deducting. He could wait.

"I'm not sure," Donna said. "Maybe Dean's. She was talking about flashing lights. Maybe yours, though?"

The Doctor laughed at the expression on Donna's face. What a strange world he'd introduced her to. Only days ago (well, months from Donna's perspective), she had asked him to take her home, and now she had digested two worlds' worth of danger and spit it back out at them.

He just wished he'd been there for that.

Without warning, the Doctor grabbed a fistful of Donna's shirt and swung her back around to him. He hadn't had a proper hug yet, and he wasn't about to go diving headfirst into another mystery without one. It just wasn't done.

"Oi!" Donna said, her voice muffled by his shirt, but he knew she didn't mind, not really.

"Missed you," he whispered.

"Missed you too," she said. It was only loud enough for his ears. And she wouldn't ever admit to saying it if he called her on it later.

He released her at last and straightened his shoulders when he saw, out of the corner of his eye, that Dean was headed his way. "What's the problem, then?" the Doctor asked. "Are we extending our stay in your past?"

Dean winced at that. Just a small wince, hardly enough for anyone to notice, but the Doctor had been around Winchesters enough to pick up the subtleties. Right. He shouldn't have brought up Dean's history around strangers.

The man wouldn't even talk about it with his brother.

The Doctor sighed. "I'll take that as a yes," he said before Dean could even start to say anything. Both to stop the oncoming argument and to change tactics before Dean got too defensive about the Doctor "prodding."

Dean raised both eyebrows, but the change worked to his advantage, so he must have decided it was better not to say anything. "I think it's a demon," he announced at last.

Deborah let out a muffled cry. "A what?"

"It's got all the signs," Dean said. And there was something, a look in his eyes, that told the Doctor that Dean hadn't faced anything like this before.

The Doctor hadn't realized how innocent Dean used to be.

He missed it.

He missed it _so much_. Missed not knowing about demons or ghosts, missed when everything was explainable, even though he knew not knowing was half the adventure.

Except not knowing with Dean around meant people died.

Sometimes even the Winchesters died. Or worse.

Maybe that was why it was so hard when he saw the Impala again.

The Doctor shook himself out of his thoughts to find that Dean had turned back to Deborah with a glare. "And we're gonna hunt it down. I swear."

Graciously, the Doctor pretended not to notice that Dean's hands were shaking, or that he stepped unconsciously closer to the Doctor when he said "we."

This was Dean when he was still fragile, and it shouldn't have scared the Doctor as much as it did.


	43. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 7

A/N: This is soooo fun! I haven't been on a writing kick like this in ages! I CAN DO ANYTHING.

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, Supernatural, or any of the related rights.

...

Dean hadn't missed it. The whispering. The glances.

Donna was suspicious.

Dean trusted Donna's instinct, too, because he might not have known the Doctor for very long or very well, but he knew enough from research and scant personal experience to know that he only traveled with the best.

Well, the best and Dean. But Dean wasn't full-time, so it didn't count.

He kept half an eye on Deborah as they all piled into Donna's car (he already missed the Impala; he'd just barely convinced Dad to give it to him and they were separated already), a little blue Ford with hardly any engine left. If she'd been sticking around for a while, Dean could've fixed it up for her. It was a wonder she got anywhere in this thing.

Then again, she worked just across the street, so she probably didn't need it much.

Which begged the question: why did she have a car in the first place?

"Donna?"

Donna turned towards him with something new in her expression, almost like affection, but she'd rebuffed him before, so he shrugged it off. "Yeah?"

"You didn't just get a car to go to Topeka." It wasn't a question.

"I made a few friends in town." And now Donna wasn't looking at him.

And then it dawned on him. "Oh," he said quietly. And he said a lot more in his head, words that even Dad didn't know he knew, but he kept it to himself. Mostly because Deborah was still crying. Or pretending to cry. Or maybe crying. It was hard to tell. At any rate, he was playing it safe.

But "oh" was not sufficient to cover everything he was feeling. Because he remembered. The red hair, the attitude. Even the work uniform. This was . . . this was not happening. This was surreal.

It was just too weird. Like even for him weird. Because in no universe was it ever normal that his favorite babysitter was Donna.

He looked over at Donna and saw that her lips had tightened. He knew then that she knew he'd figured it out. So he stared pointedly out the window. No sense talking about it. No sense putting words to it that could only come back later. Better to ignore it.

Hunting. Hunting was a good distraction. He glanced up at the rearview mirror to interrogate their maybe-reliable witness. "Tell me about your boyfriend. After the change, I mean."

Deborah turned back to him, and for just a second, he could see that unplaceable emotion in her eyes. He didn't have a name for it yet, but it was something like recognition. Only with more loathing.

And then, like always, the look passed, and Deborah was a scared girl again. "He shouted for me," Deborah said slowly. "And everything smelled weird . . . ." She paused, wrung her hands, and looked down at the floor of the car. "I sound crazy."

"No, you don't," Dean assured her quickly. _If anything, the whole setup sounds too perfect_, he thought, but he didn't say that out loud. If he was just being suspicious for no reason, well, he didn't want to upset a civilian.

"Yes, I do," Deborah insisted. "But thanks for lying."

Oh, she was good.

Dean found himself grinning for no reason and leaning back in the seat, taking Deborah in as he pulled to a stop at a red light. (Of course he had insisted on driving.) Not gorgeous or anything, but then, he'd never really held out for a ten before. And curls like that . . . .

He grinned again. Even if she turned out evil, maybe he and she could . . . .

"Stop it," the Doctor warned from the backseat.

Dean looked affronted. "What did I do?"

The Doctor didn't have an answer, but of course, he didn't really need one. Dean really hated time travel if it meant the Doctor knew him so well. It was weird, like an invasion of privacy but more, strangely, intimate.

The light turned green, Dean turned left, and all of a sudden, Deborah turned green. "Here," she said quietly. "Here's where it happened."

"And you walked all the way to your complex from here?" Dean asked. He wrinkled his nose. They were on the other side of town, middle of nowhere, at a gas station that wasn't even open this time of night.

"I ran part of the way," Deborah said defensively. "I thought I was going to die!"

The pitch her voice hit hurt his ears, so Dean raised his hands. "Alright, alright, I get it. Scared means fast. Been there." He turned the car off, opened the door, and tossed Donna the keys all in one, fluid motion. In the next motion, he was kneeling on the ground, looking for signs of sulfur, sniffing like a hunting dog.

He didn't want anyone to know he hadn't done this before. The demon-hunting thing.

He'd done hunts with Dad, yeah. Once they even hunted a demon, but it was Bobby and Dad and Sam and Dean and it was a lot easier to be confident you could win when Bobby had his hand on your shoulder. But nothing ever this big. Not on his own.

He told his hand to stop shaking. He'd give himself away.

Gritting his teeth, Dean combed every inch of the parking lot with his gaze, flashlight in hand and gun in his pocket, ready just in case. He wished it was the shotgun with the rock salt, but he hadn't planned on going on a hunt when he was just jumping into the TARDIS to grab Donna and vamoose.

There and back again. Dean grinned to himself. That's what this was supposed to be.

And then he told himself never to go anywhere without at least five weapons and logged it away in his _Master List of Ways Dean Can Be a Better Hunter_.

"What are you looking for?" Donna asked as she and Deborah made their way over. Deborah was clinging hard to Donna's arm, and the way Donna flinched, Dean wondered if maybe Deborah had heard what Donna said to the Doctor. It looked almost mean.

"Traces of sulfur," Dean said. "I'd have brought my EMF if I thought I'd be hunting; that would give us a better clue." He thought of the Walkman at home and wondered if he could take it apart and put it back together as an EMF so he wouldn't have to borrow Bobby's all the time. (Even though he was pretty sure Bobby always had an extra one lying around just for him.)

The Doctor sniffed and then licked the ground. Dean shuddered, and so did the Doctor, but then the Doctor straightened up and brushed off his lapels. "Hard to tell. Too many cars," the Doctor said as he lolled out his tongue to counteract the taste of concrete.

"It wouldn't be just traces," Dean amended. "I mean you'd find pure, yellow stuff if it was a demon."

"How come you know so much about all this?" Deborah asked. Her tone was actually genuinely curious. So she was being honest now. That was going to be difficult to keep up with.

"Been doing this kind of stuff my whole life," Dean said.

"_Why_?" Deborah sounded genuinely surprised, and maybe just a little bit disappointed.

"Because." Dean felt his back stiffen and willed himself to loosen up. Not in front of the civvies. Don't let the cracks in the armor shine through. Not until you're safe at home.

Deborah seemed to know enough, at least, not to press him for more. That was good; Dean wasn't sure what he would have done if she'd pressed him, especially not in front of the Doctor and Donna.

"I'm not seeing anything, Dean," Donna said, and when he looked up, he was again surprised by the friendliness and warmth in her eyes that made him want to look away again.

Weird, too weird.

But when he looked back up, she had appropriately changed her smile to be one more trusting, more letting him take the lead than "watching my kid brother grow up" kind of a smile. A lot less awkward, a lot less weird. He smiled back at her, tentatively.

"Well," the Doctor said slowly, the way only he could say that word, "it might not be a demon, then."

Dean looked up at the Doctor and raised an eyebrow. _Might not be a demon_. Said so casually Dean might make the mistake of thinking the Doctor actually believed in all this stuff.

Maybe he did.

Dean shook his head and looked back at Deborah, who had now changed entirely while he had his back turned. He took a step back and blinked, trying to get his brain to remember how to tell his jaw to shut.

This was like nothing he had ever seen before. This was power and fire and rage and safety all at once.

Dean closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, absolutely sure that he was going to die.


	44. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 8

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who, Supernatural, or any of the related rights.

...

The Doctor snatched his glasses off his face, just in case the rims might somehow obscure his vision of the magnificent creature in front of him.

"What?" he whispered, his energy and confidence in his knowledge gone. And then, recovering slightly, "Well, you're gorgeous, you are. Absolutely stunning!"

And she was. Light seemed to gather around Deborah as she squared her shoulders and puffed out her chest. That same light was pooled in a greater concentration in her eyes, and the Doctor could swear that he saw the outline of wings as the light flashed, creating the illusion of lightning and the sonic disruption of thunder. This was power like he had never seen before, and before the Doctor realized what he was doing, he had shoved his glasses back up onto his nose to study her.

"I mean it. You're _gorgeous_," the Doctor said more insistently before a noise behind him startled him and he turned just in time to see Dean raise his gun and fire six rounds right into Deborah's chest.

Typical Winchester reaction. He shouldn't have been surprised. Shoot first, ask questions never.

Still, he couldn't help voicing his annoyance: "Oi!" He turned to Dean to give him what-for, but something in Dean's gaze stopped him.

He turned back to Deborah. To his surprise, she seemed hardly dented. The only evidences of Dean's hunting instincts were the tears in her clothes, the bullet-shaped holes and the split fabric around them. And there were only three. Three for the heart, three for the head. (Dean was a good shot; any soldier would admit that.) But the three head shots? Not a trace of them anywhere on Deborah's body.

Despite this, Dean kept his gun raised steadily. "Knew I shouldn't have trusted you," he said through gritted teeth. "So what are you? Shape shifter? What's with the wings?"

Deborah turned to Dean with the softest and yet sharpest smile. "You'd be smart to pay me some respect. I'm an angel, if you must know, as if it wasn't already obvious."

Donna sighed heavily, "Didn't you two dumbos get rid of the ones I left you with?"

The Doctor glanced at Dean, who was absently rubbing at his eyes at the mention of angels. He was frowning, but this time in concentration. Only then did the Doctor realize how hard Dean had been fighting the angels. Even just the mention of their name could set him off.

But Deborah turned to Donna with a puzzled expression. "What are you talking about?" she breathed her words quietly. Then, tilting her head, she said simply, "Ah. Weeping angels. I see."

Donna, at this point, rubbed her forehead, and the Doctor was quite sure Deborah had just been through his friend's mind.

"No, I have no affiliation with the weeping angels," Deborah said quietly, carefully. She turned to the Doctor with a meaningful glance, and he knew she knew more about him than he let on. Then, drawing herself up even further, she said, "I am an angel of the Lord."

"No such thing," Dean said fiercely.

Deborah's eyes flashed with that same, intense life, and when it crackled around her to frame her wings, even the doctor had a hard time coming up with a rebuttal to that.

The Doctor frowned and bit his lip. This couldn't be happening, shouldn't be happening. Sure, he'd seen some things in his life, demons and ghosts and even werewolves with Rose, but this?

And he'd said it before. He'd seen demi-gods and would-be gods and entire pantheons. He'd seen beings who had set themselves up as gods over entire planets and systems. But he had also seen the healing power of faith, the tenacity with which its people clung to it, the comfort of belief. And so, maybe, somewhere, some of the faith was true.

Maybe.

The Doctor raised his eyebrow at Dean. "What, so you believe in demons but not in angels?" he asked, hoping that his tone sounded light. He still wasn't sure to make of the situation, after all, but he hoped he sounded at least confident enough to bluff.

"If there were angels," Dean said, his face turning reddish at the edges, "where were they when my mom died, huh?" The question seemed to explode out of him, and then, as if he realized he had said too much, he blinked and quickly added, "Where were they when any of the monsters I've hunted were tearing people to shreds?"

Something in Deborah's face changed, and she tilted her head at Dean in an expression that the Doctor could only describe as curiosity, though Deborah's emotions were hard to read, even with his extra psychic sense. "Mary?" she asked quietly.

It was almost like someone had physically punched Dean in the gut. He staggered back just the slightest bit, his eyes burning.

Donna, on the other hand, had an even stronger reaction. She gasped, and her hands flew to her mouth, her eyes brimming with tears. And then the Doctor realized how close Donna and Mary had really been.

…

"Can't you stop it?" Donna asked before she could stop the words from coming out of her mouth.

Deborah turned to her with that same head tilt, the one that meant she was processing, was curious. "Blimey, don't angels even have a sense of empathy?" Donna asked. "What bloody use are you?"

At this, Deborah's eyes narrowed. Her eyes flashed like before, but Donna was having none of that. She wasn't about to be intimidated by a light show. "What's the point of lying to us, anyway, luring us out here with some pretend story?"

"I had to be sure we were away from any prying eyes," Deborah said simply. "It's tricky messing with time." At that, she looked right at the Doctor, and anyone with eyes could see that Deborah knew exactly who they were.

"So you brought us out here to, what, tell us not to interfere?" Dean said. "You're wasting your breath. We already knew—"

"I came because your presence is threatening important events," Deborah said, and her voice sounded more like thunder than actual words. She whirled around to face Dean, who looked somehow smaller. "This was supposed to be a simple assignment. Look after the Winchesters. Just until November, and then I have to look in on a prophet receiving his first revelation," she said, shrugging. "I'm what you might call a recorder. Relating to Heaven the important things so they don't have to waste time doing it themselves."

"Like a reporter?" Donna asked and was rewarded with a sneer from Deborah. So there was something that could get a rise out of angels.

"Then what are you doing interfering?" Dean asked. "If you just report the news, I'm pretty sure you're not allowed to _make _it."

Deborah glared at the Doctor. "It's _his _fault."

The Doctor placed a hand over one of his hearts. "Mine?"

"Don't think I can't see right through you. If I send you back to your right time, you'll send Dean here right into the weeping angels' embrace."

"And you're authorized to stop that, are you?"

"No," Deborah said quickly, her gaze darting heavenward. "But I'm authorized to keep the timeline clean, and if you're going to stick around trying to fix your heads and cure yourselves of angel dust before you go back where you belong, I can . . . speed up the process." A smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. "It's not disobedience, just a . . . shortcut."

If Donna hadn't known better, she would have mistaken the disobedience for affection. And if that was the case, well, Donna could hardly blame Deborah. After all, it had taken little Dean all of three minutes to worm his way into Donna's heart.

Despite their current situation, Donna could see a grudging smile tugging at the edge of the Doctor's mouth. This was exactly the kind of person that she could see the Doctor inviting along. She had orders, yes, but she was going to follow them to her own tune.

"And you're just volunteering out of the goodness of your heart?" Dean sneered. "I find that hard to believe."

"Do you want my help or not?" Deborah asked, her voice like thunder again. "This is the easiest way to keep you out of the timeline I've been assigned to watch, but if you'd rather I sent you across the country for good measure . . . . "

Dean held up his hands in a gesture of solidarity.

Donna felt herself stepping closer to Dean before she even made the conscious decision to walk that way. "And what happens here? In this time?" she asked, thinking of Mary, of the Dean who was and the Dean who stood next to her and the difference between them.

Deborah looked right at Dean when she said, "It should happen the way he remembers it. I think." She glanced heavenward again. "They'd stop me if something really bad was going to happen."

"Okay, enough talk," Dean said, stepping forward with false bravado in his voice. "More action."

Donna thought of Mary and decided not to argue for more information, not to point out that they couldn't trust Deborah.

The Doctor tilted his head at Deborah. "I've been all over Earth and never encountered anyone of your species before. Why is that?"

But instead of answering, Deborah just reached out and planted her palm on the Doctor's forehead. There was a weird sort of light around Deborah's hand that entered the Doctor's eyes, and then he crumpled to the ground without even throwing out an arm to catch himself—completely unconscious.

"Doctor!" Donna shouted, headed toward her friend.

But Dean got there first, crouching down next to the Doctor, checking his vitals so expertly that Donna knew he'd had to do this with friends many times before. "He's still alive," he said quickly, then turned to Deborah with a fire in his eyes that was not like Deborah's at all. "What did you do?"

Deborah didn't answer him. Instead, she just reached out and did the same to Dean. This time, the light was much brighter, and Donna thought she heard Dean shout in pain, but the light blinded her.

And when she could see again, Dean was also unconscious, and Deborah was gone.


	45. Book Five: Mary, Chapter 9

A/N: This is the last chapter of Book 5. Book 6 will be up by Tuesday. And in case you were wondering, there will be nine "books" total, followed by a short hiatus while I do NaNoWriMo, then Season 2! Yay! I have the second "season" all planned out :)

Disclaimer: I don't own anything related to Doctor Who or Supernatural.

...

Deborah was concerned.

It was the first time she'd really felt human emotion.

Well, that wasn't true.

She'd been recognizing the signs for a few years now. She was forming attachments. She was actually _reluctant _to leave in November, even if it was only for a few days at the beginning of the month.

And she really hadn't needed to save Dean just to get him out of his own timeline. She could have picked any other way, including sending him back to the right time on her own power.

Was this the first step to independent thought?

Deborah shuddered. She hoped not.

And what was it that Donna had said about empathy? She'd talked about it like it was such a wonderful thing to have.

Maybe this was worth investigating.

After all, that's what reporters did.

...

When Dean woke up, he was in the TARDIS, though he felt considerably more scratched and bruised than before. His eyes hurt, too, but a sore kind of hurt, like they're been used way too much, like when he'd had to pull all-nighters.

He pushed himself up on his elbows to look around. "What happened?" he asked thickly. He still hadn't quite recovered all of his facilities.

The Doctor, who had been rubbing his fingers to his temples, looked up at Dean. "How are you feeling?" he asked quietly.

"Sore. Tired. Don't know from what, though," Dean said. He groaned and put a hand to his head. He could see now why the Doctor had been rubbing his—it hurt!

"What's the last thing you remember?" the Doctor asked, and it sounded urgent. Probably because Dean couldn't remember getting in the TARDIS.

"I remember you were explaining how to fight the weeping angels . . . ." Dean sat up straighter and pulled himself painfully into a standing position. "The angels! Are they still out there?"

Almost on cue, someone came bustling out of the back door carrying blankets, salves, and a myriad of other curatives. From behind the stack, Dean could just see the flash of red hair and remembered the Doctor's newest companion. What was her name again? Dean pressed in on his temples. He was usually good with names, but his memory of the past few hours was surprisingly fuzzy.

"Oh good," the redhead said. "You're awake." She set down her bundle and crossed the TARDIS console room to lean casually against the controls. "I was starting to think maybe I'd knocked something important around when I dragged you both in here."

"You did that, Donna?" the Doctor asked, and his voice sounded more than a little relieved. One mystery solved, then. At least they knew how they got to the TARDIS in the first place.

Donna nodded.

"But the weeping angels," Dean insisted, not to be deterred.

"Oh, you took care of them just fine," Donna said. "Got them staring at each other and then wrapped some kind of . . . oh, what did the Doctor call it . . . perception thingy around them."

"Perception filter?" the Doctor asked.

"That was it!" Donna said, smiling. "At least, that's the story you told me."

Dean frowned and pressed his fingers to his forehead again. "I don't like it. How come I don't remember doing any of that?"

Both the Doctor and Dean looked to Donna, who seemed to be the one with the answers.

Donna swallowed. "I'm, ah, not sure how much I'm allowed to tell you."

"Are you okay?" the Doctor asked, swiftly crossing the console room to lay a concerned hand on his friend's arm and turn her to face him. His gaze swept over all of her, checking for anything out of place. "Are you being threatened?"

Donna jerked her arm out of the Doctor's grasp. "Personal space, spaceman!" she quipped, then turned her attention back to the story. "It's nothing like that, I promise."

"Then what is it?"

"Well, she didn't explain very well," Donna said. She pointed to her head. "Left me a little message in here, like a voice mail." She grimaced. "Feels weird."

"Who?" Dean asked. He was completely lost, and that didn't happen very often.

Donna turned the full force of her smile on him, and he was taken aback by the intensity and compassion and understanding in that smile. It wasn't the kind of smile she had given him just a little while ago when they'd first met. This was love and friendship and care wrapped up in a single expression, and now Dean wanted more than anything to know what he had missed. He'd give anything to get a gorgeous girl to smile at him like that, and he'd like to know how he did it.

Dean took a slight step back.

"I can't tell you that," Donna said.

"Why? Who's making you say that?" the Doctor demanded. He had drawn himself up to his full height and whirled Donna around so that he could face him. This was the Doctor that Dean had heard about from Martha and Rose, the thundering anger, the power behind the quirkiness. It was just a glimpse, of course, but Dean couldn't help being impressed.

When the Doctor raised his fingers to press them to Donna's temple, Donna swatted him away. "Oi," she said dangerously. "None of that!"

"I was just going to—"

"I know what you were going to do, and you can't do that," Donna said. Her gaze blazed with defiance, but then, at last, she slumped down into the yellow captain's seat by the console. "Look," she said, her voice subdued, "your memories were tainted. Your experience was tainted. And when the weeping angels dust or whatever it was got taken out of your heads, so did the memories."

Dean frowned. Something in the back of his head insisted that he remembered something like this, remembered dust in his hands and a headache much more severe than the one he had now.

"Ah!" He groaned and dropped to his knees as a myriad of pictures assaulted his mind. Angel statues and grotesque faces. The Impala's lights fading over the hilltop. A woman crying. Donna. And, for some reason, Mom.

And then there were hands on either side of his face, forcing the pictures out of his mental reach, and the TARDIS swam back into view. The Doctor was crouching in front of him, hands on either side of Dean's head and a concerned expression painted all over his face. Donna was crouched next to him, but the concern on her face was amplified beyond what the Doctor wore.

And he'd seen her face in those images. She'd been there with him doing . . . something.

"Don't go looking," the Doctor said severely. "I think I've put them far enough away that you won't think of them, but don't go looking for those memories."

"They should be safe to remember eventually," Donna said, and with her eyes closed, it was easy to tell that she was simply accessing information she had been left with. "So if you stumble across more angels and they come back, you should be fine. But try not to, just to be safe, okay?"

"So, what, you're the only one who's allowed to remember this stuff?"

"Like I could ever forget," Donna said. "You're an adventure all on your own, sweetheart." Again, Donna fixed him with that smile, and Dean very nearly disobeyed orders and went looking for her memory to see why she was looking at him like that.

But he'd been given an order. Albeit one given by the Doctor, but still.

"So the house is taken care of?" Dean asked at last.

"Yeah," Donna said.

"And whatever it did to us has been reversed?"

"Yeah."

"And no one died?"

Donna paused for just a second too long when she said, "Yeah."

"Well," the Doctor said, breaking in at last. "Sounds like we've had a productive day, Donna Noble to the rescue as always—" He paused to flash Donna his best grin. "—and we're all still standing. Brilliant! I love it when that happens." He turned his huge grin Dean's way. "So, any chance we can convince you to stay?"

Dean stuck his hands in his pockets, trying to look casual as he tried not to say that _of course _he'd like to stay in the TARDIS. But then his fingers wrapped around a paper jammed in his left pocket, and he pulled it out, unfolded it, and read with a frown.

Coordinates.

It had to be Dad.

Dean didn't even have to say anything. The Doctor just looked at him and sighed theatrically. "Of course. Family comes first." He read something on the console and blinked in surprise. "Well, we could at least get you in the right time. Back to the house the morning after our adventure?"

Donna cleared her throat. "Well, if you want to take him to his car, you should drop him off in Canada, actually."

Dean turned to Donna incredulously. "Why'd I go there?"

Donna just smiled.

…..

Dean cried the first time one of his letters to Donna was sent back to him as unmailable. Mary had tried to calm him down, to tell him that sometimes people leave and there's nothing you can do about it, but Dean seemed to think that was unacceptable. ("Not if they love you, Mom. They never leave then.")

But time wore on, and as Sammy got bigger and Dean got older, Mary sometimes let Dean help her with little things like dinnertime or playtime. Dean took to it like a fish to water, and some of her most relaxing afternoons were spent watching her two little boys playing together. Dean, who was still too young to understand all of Sammy's limitations, had taken it upon himself to teach his little brother all about superheroes.

"And this one's Batman," Dean said, holding up one of his action figures. "When you get big enough to stop biting off their heads, you can have a Robin and be my sidekick, okay?"

Sammy just stared at him with his big eyes, sucking insistently on the Superman pacifier Dean had insisted they buy when they went to the store.

Mary leaned back and smiled. The letters to Donna had stopped. Dean had someone new to take care of.


	46. Book Six: Trust, Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

Rose laughed as she crashed into the floor.

Jack landed next to her, and then the Doctor, and she grinned at her boys. Jack smirked back at her with eyes that said something particularly naughty, so she just laughed again and turned to the other side to ask the Doctor, "Where have we landed? Somewhere exciting, I hope, seeing as it's Jack's first trip."

"Rose, I'm hurt," her Doctor grinned back at her, placing a hand over one of his hearts. "Are you suggesting I'd _ever _take you somewhere boring?"

"There was that time we landed on a planet with an unbreathable atmosphere and you made me stay in," Rose pointed out.

"Once!" the Doctor protested. He held out a hand to help her to her feet and then offered Jack the same.

"And what about that Planet of Perpetual Lullabies?" Rose continued. "I fell asleep straight off!"

The Doctor laughed, "It's hardly my fault you humans can't keep your eyes open. Didn't even make it through the first song!" He said that last bit to Jack with a conspiratorial grin.

"I just said I was tired!"

"So I helped!"

"You call that helping? I slept for a whole day!"

The Doctor just grinned over at Jack and raised his eyebrows at him.

"Oh, knock it off, you two," Rose laughed at last.

The Doctor laughed, and Jack brushed off his jacket sleeves. "No, but really, Doctor," Jack said at last. "Where are we?"

"Well," the Doctor said, "I was _aiming _for the World Expo, United States, 1930s." The frown and the way he pulled at his leather sleeves told Rose that they were definitely _not _at the World Expo, United States, 1930s.

"So where are we then?" Rose asked cheerily. She was always up for new places, even if they didn't always land where the Doctor said they would.

"We're in Maine. 1990s," the Doctor said, still wearing that same frown. She was learning to tell them apart, and this was his _this is going to be boring _frown, not his _I can't steer the TARDIS perfectly _frown.

But Rose knew she'd have fun no matter where they went (even if it put her to sleep), so she laced her arm through the Doctor's and smiled at him, dragging Jack along by the crook of his arm so that she was standing in between the two of them. "Well, I've always wanted to visit America," she said, grinning.

The Doctor's smile could have reached his ears, and Jack whispered, "You're not missing much, not in this decade anyway."

She shoved Jack playfully.

The Doctor, now with a little more spring in his step, bounded through the now-open TARDIS doors. "Right then," he said with a laugh, "welcome to the state of Maine!"

Rose pulled Jack out the doors and tried not to be too disappointed that he wasn't as shocked as she had been when she first traveled with the Doctor. (Then again, he was a Time Agent. Or ex-Time Agent, whatever. But he'd done this sort of thing before. Just not in the TARDIS.) Still, she had to smile when Jack stopped outside the TARDIS to admire it. After all, it had been in his ship when he first stepped in, and he hadn't gotten a good look.

"She really is a police telephone box," Jack laughed. "I've seen them around, but even for this time, isn't it a bit . . . anachronistic?"

"Oi!" the Doctor said. "Don't dis the TARDIS."

"Boys," Rose said, and she tried to make her voice sound more like a warning than a laugh, but it wasn't working.

But it worked anyway, and Jack turned to look out over the forest they had right in front of them. "I've always liked hiking," Jack said at last. "Looks like just the right season for it."

And it was. The leaves were changing colors, the air was just cold enough to need a coat but not cold enough to hurt their throats when they breathed in. And there were even clouds in the sky so the sun wasn't bearing down on them.

And then Jack had her around the middle, and she couldn't do anything except gasp in delight, surprise, annoyance, all of the above, as she found herself barreling headfirst into a huge pile of leaves.

It was war.

There was no shortage of ammunition, either, and it took them no time at all to build makeshift forts. Dirt, leaves, and even a few bugs started flying through the air.

Rose piled up a bunch of leaves, busying herself with the totally unfair advantage she had that both Jack and the Doctor were ignoring her in favor of the other. When it was high enough that she could plausibly be hiding behind it, she dug her hands deep into the earth, got some particularly squishy mud, and made her way towards Jack, careful not to let the gooey stuff leak out the sides of her fingers as she went.

But there was no being sneaky with the Doctor around. He must have seen her plan coming a mile away, because all of a sudden, he was running across the battle lines, picking her up, slinging her over his shoulder, and charging Jack with a fake battle cry.

Jack threw most of his ammo at them, but now the Doctor was using her as a shield, so Rose retaliated by smearing her fistfuls of mud all over his head. He dropped her, and she rolled out of the way while Jack unloaded the rest of his leaves.

And thus was born her unspoken alliance with Jack.

Without saying a word to each other—with nothing more than a nod, really—Rose and Jack knew what to do. While the Doctor flicked some of the mud out of his ears (it was hard to miss those), Rose snuck around behind him with Jack distracted him by throwing a fistful of drier dirt that got everywhere and made the Doctor sneeze.

Rose was almost all the way behind the Doctor . . . and then she fell through his clever trap and into a pile of leaves. As she glared at him and flicked a beetle off her shoulder, the Doctor just grinned down at her with this _look _that said, without him ever having to say it, that she was going to have to do a lot better to beat a soldier like him. He'd survived wars, after all. He was a tactician.

He was very full of himself, and Rose was going to have to do something about that.

Rose grabbed the side of the hole to pull herself up and out—just in time to see the Doctor get a faceful of dirt. Jack grinned at her and gave her a thumbs up, and she grinned in return—only to be rewarded with a similar clump of mud in her face.

She wiped her face and glared at Jack, but he just smiled innocently. "What?" he mouthed, since he was a good distance away, and it was hard to be playful like that when you were shouting.

"Oh, you're getting it," Rose shouted at him. She grabbed the back of the Doctor's jacket and pulled. "Stealing this, thanks."

The Doctor kept his arms straight to keep her from getting hold of his jacket. "Oi, I like this jacket!"

"I'll give it back," Rose said.

"I don't want it back if you're going to use it like a slingshot!" the Doctor countered. But then, when Rose started to take off her own jacket to prove a point, he relented and gave it to her. "Careful!"

"Drama queen," Rose whispered back at him and stuck her tongue out.

She dived behind her pile of leaves and started scooping as fast as she could. She could hear the scuffling behind her leaf pile, but she figured the Doctor could handle herself long enough for her to get behind Jack.

When she peeked out of her hiding place again, she saw the Doctor pull out his sonic screwdriver. She didn't know what he had done, but the entire leaf pile in front of Jack exploded, and then Jack was shouting, "That's cheating!"

It might have been cheating, but it was exactly the distraction Rose needed to get around behind Jack, pull the Doctor's jacket tight, and then . . . .

"HELP ME!"

The cry echoed through the whole forest, surprising birds and squirrels out of their hiding place and making it difficult to tell where the shouts were coming from.

Instantly, their little group changed course. Jack straightened up and pulled a pistol out of a pocket somewhere on his coat. The Doctor had crossed to Rose in a second to pluck his jacket out of her grasp, give it a shake, and throw it around his shoulders.

He made a face when there were still some bugs and leaves in the sleeves, and he shook them out with an exasperated glance her way (which she responded to with her best, most convincing innocent eyes).

"Any idea where it came from?" Jack asked the Doctor.

The Doctor licked a finger and stuck it in the air, then shook his head. "Too hard to tell," he said. Then, he brightened. "We'll just have to go on a manhunt."

"HELP ME!" came the shout again. Definitely a girl.

"Or a woman-hunt," Rose said with a half-smile.

The Doctor grinned and offered her his still-dirty arm. "Shall we?"

She tucked her arm through his and gave him her biggest smile. "Always."

A/N: This one's fun because I've never written Nine or Jack before. And yes, this is the story Rose was referring to in Book Two. It's finally happening. :)

To the three or four reviewers who have been asking about Cas: I've only got three more books left, and since this story is chronological from Dean's perspective, we won't make it to Dean and Cas's timeline . . . . This isn't to say that the Doctor doesn't ever meet Cas. Or that he hasn't met Cas in some upcoming adventures and has to keep that knowledge secret . . . . Or something like that . . . .SHHH SPOILERS.


	47. Book Six: Trust, Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Doctor Who or Supernatural or any of the related rights.

...

Dean stretched out his legs in the front seat and glanced over at Dad. He seemed distracted, looking for signs of trouble, so he decided not to say anything.

He was getting restless, though. They'd been trapped in the car for hours, and he was ready to stretch his legs. He could have scooted his chair back to give himself more room, but Sammy was behind him, sleeping, and Dean didn't want to disturb him.

He leaned his head back against the headrest of his seat and tried to lose himself in Dad's music. He smiled wide when he recognized the opening notes, the gradual buildup, and then—

"Pressure!" He mouthed the first word with particular glee.

"Pushing down on me

Pressing down on you

No man asks for

Under pressure

That burns a building down

Splits a family in two

Puts people on street."

He turned around to see if Sammy was awake enough to sing along with him, since he knew Dad wouldn't. But, no, the kid was still zonked out, completely dead to the world. Lucky duck.

Dean shrugged and went back to singing to himself under his breath, which was fast becoming a habit of his:

"It's the terror of knowing

What this world is about

Watching some good friends

Screaming, 'Let me out!'"

And then Dad reached out and turned off the radio. He was sitting up a little straighter, and he had the hunting look.

Dean immediately sat up as well, looking for whatever signs Dad had picked up on and berating himself for not catching them sooner. First rule of hunting: stay alert the second you hit the town.

"See anything?" Dean asked, leaning forward.

"Not yet," Dad said out of the corner of his mouth. He didn't say anything else, but Dean understood without Dad having to say it. He hadn't seen anything yet, so he was listening now.

They hadn't even really hit the town yet. If you could call it a town. They were still driving through miles and miles of trees that all looked the same to Dean, and he hadn't seen any sign of the trees letting up any time soon.

Dad must have seen something he hadn't.

The sudden and deafening silence in the car must have startled Sam out of his nap, because he jerked up, stretched, and looked at Dean, his gaze a silent question: _What did I miss?_

Dean jerked his head toward Dad, who was sitting up straight and had the army posture that meant he was taking in possible clues.

Sam settled back down into the backseat with a scathing look.

Dean raised his eyebrows at his brother. _What's that look for?_

Sam pulled his head further into his shoulders. _Here we go again _was what the look said.

Dean turned around and looked forward so he couldn't see his brother anymore. That look always worried him. It used to only come up maybe once a month, but he was seeing it a lot more often. And the kid was coming up on fifteen, so Dean kept telling himself it was a phase. Most kids his age rebelled. Just rebelling in the Winchester family meant wanting to be normal. That's all it was.

He glanced up at the rearview mirror and saw that the look wasn't gone, and this time he couldn't convince himself that there wasn't something else going on in his brother's freaky head.

Dean was about to turn around and say something to Sam, something about how he looked stupid in the shirt he was wearing because the sleeves were way too short for him (if he wasn't careful, he'd outgrow Dean, and that would _suck_), but Dad stiffened.

Dean immediately went on alert, looking for anything that could tell him what Dad had seen that he had so stupidly missed. And then he spotted them—the flock of birds up above the treetops.

He beat Dad to his window and cranked the handle to roll it down, sticking his head out the window to listen for anything that might have spooked the birds.

Even Sammy was sitting up now, intent, listening. He might complain about hunting when they weren't doing it, but he understood just as well as the rest of them that focusing on anything but the task at hand while they were hunting could very well get someone killed. So he shoved the annoyance deep down inside him.

Problem was, it seemed to get bigger whenever he shoved it away.

Still, Dean was glad for the temporary reprieve. Maybe Sam and Dad wouldn't fight this time.

Yeah, right.

Dean pulled his head back in the window of the car and was about to say that maybe they had missed it when the shout echoed all over the forest: "HELP ME!"

Dad floored it.

Dean leaned further toward the window, trying to see through the blur of trees in front of them. "Don't hit her," he said before he could stop himself. "Careful."

"I know!" Dad half-snarled as he spun the wheel to follow a curve in the road.

Of course Dad had it under control. Stupid to say anything.

Suddenly, the road widened, and the entire town spread out before them. Dad slammed on the brakes, and Dean didn't even wait for the Impala to stop before he jumped out of the car. He already knew what to do, but he waited for Dad to say it anyway.

"Dean," Dad said, pointing east.

Dean nodded; it was all he needed. He took off, glad to finally have an excuse to stretch his legs, and hardly heard Dad giving instructions to Sam and Sam doing that annoying _thing _where he tried to make Dad give him the hows and the whys and the wheretofores of every order. Time was life, Sammy!

Dean had been keeping track of the turns in the road, and he figured he was about where he had last heard the girl scream. So if he turned this way into the forest, if he kept track of where he was headed . . . .

He barely had time to dive aside before someone almost came crashing into him. He slipped into a crouch, ready to attack, but he immediately relaxed when he saw who it was.

Rose.

He grinned, headed towards her to ask her where the Doctor was, but she took a step back, glaring at him with suspicious eyes.

He raised his eyebrows and was about to ask her what the problem was when someone _else _came barreling through the forest, and this someone didn't stop when she nearly knocked Rose over.

Rose glanced at Dean, sized him up, and took off running after the girl.

Dean was, of course, faster, and he managed to catch up to the running girl first. He grabbed her arm and dodged the expected swing. "Whoa, whoa," he said, putting on his "charm the civilian" smile. "I'm on your side. I heard you scream."

The girl glared at him, and Rose caught up to them both. "Is this guy bothering you?" Rose asked. She drew herself up, and Dean couldn't help but be proud of how she was handling the situation.

He also couldn't help being a little sad, too. It had only been a year for him since his last encounter with the Doctor, and now that he'd found somebody, she didn't recognize him.

He remembered vaguely that Rose had met him first. She'd said something about it when he was fourteenish, but he didn't really remember the specifics. He tried not to do that with time traveling friends. Knowing too much was a bad thing; that much he knew from Star Trek.

"Look," Dean said, releasing the girl's arm and holding up his hands. "I swear I just came looking to make sure you're okay. We heard you scream while we were driving into town—"

"You have a car?" the girl asked suddenly.

"It's just down the road," he nodded.

"Can you take me home, then?" she asked, and this time, she made no effort to hide the tears springing to her eyes.

"Of course I can," Dean said. He kept his voice low and calm and gentle. "Can you tell me what happened?"

To Dean's surprise, the girl burst into tears. She grabbed hold of Dean's shirt and wouldn't let go as she sobbed, "_They killed him!_"

Dean paused for only a second before he awkwardly wrapped his arms around her. She was _tiny_. "Who? Did you see their faces?"

Underneath his arms, Dean could feel her shake his head.

"Dean!" That was Dad shouting for him.

He really should answer right away. But if Rose was here, the Doctor wouldn't be far behind. And Dad wasn't going to take well to an alien.

Okay, time to revise the plan.

He pushed the crying girl just far enough away so that he could look her in the eyes. "We're going to keep you safe. I promise." Then, he turned to Rose, who had been watching him so carefully that he knew he wouldn't have been able to make a false move without her pouncing—which, he had to say, was a hilarious mental image. "Can you take her down to the police station?" he asked (this, at least, seemed to soften Rose's attitude toward him; after all, a serial killer in the woods wouldn't give up the girl). He turned to the crying girl. "Would that be okay?"

"Can't you come too?" she asked, still holding onto his shirt.

"Dean!" That was Dad getting impatient.

"Coming, Dad!" he shouted. He pulled himself out of the crying girl's clutches and pulled Rose aside. "Take her to the police. Use your psychic paper. Be cops or something."

Rose's eyes were wide. "How did you—"

"No time to chat," Dean said hurriedly. "I gotta go." Without really thinking, he kissed Rose's cheek the way he'd wanted to when he first met her a few years ago. Then, with a hurried, whispered, "Don't tell the Doctor you've seen me. He hasn't met me yet. See ya', Rose!" he took off running back toward Dad's voice.

He'd tell Dad that the cops showed up to get the girl before he could get there. No need for Dad to stumble into meeting the Doctor.

He'd just get to the police station first and keep a lookout for them. If they were here, he knew they'd be in danger.


	48. Book Six: Trust, Chapter 3

A/N: I really love writing this story, and it thrills me to no end that you crazy people have somehow been tricked into reading and liking it along with me :P

Disclaimer: I don't own the rights to Supernatural or Doctor Who.

...

Time travel.

Rose shook her head. She knew it could be complicated, but she'd never run into this particular problem before. The meeting people out of order thing.

She sighed and turned her attention back to the task at hand: getting this girl somewhere safe. She smiled and offered her arm. "Let's get you home, then," she said. "Can you tell me your name?"

"Alice," the girl said through muffled tears. "What's yours?"

"I'm Rose."

"And who's your friend?"

Rose looked startled. "I . . . don't know him," she said at last. He had certainly surprised her, talking the way he did about the Doctor and everything. When she'd first run into him, he'd gone right into soldier mode, had taken her by surprise. But now he seemed more like a big brother than a soldier, and she wasn't sure which identity she was supposed to believe.

The crying girl stared at Rose for a second longer than Rose was comfortable with before, at last, she turned away and said with a sly smile, "He's kinda cute."

"He is, isn't he?" Rose said without meaning to.

"Can we go find him?" Alice asked. When Rose raised her eyebrows at her, she blushed. "I just . . . he seems like he'd be . . . safe."

Rose frowned when she saw the tears filling Alice's eyes. She supposed, yes, that a guy like that would make _anyone _feel safe, but she had the Doctor, and that had to count for something. "Listen," she said, "I've got a friend. His name's the Doctor. He can help with whatever it is that's after you, I promise."

"So, you're not alone, then?" Alice asked, and she seemed to brighten up at the prospect. Rose couldn't really blame her; if she'd been alone in this forest and seen someone die . . . .

"Doctor!" Rose shouted. She wrapped her arm around Alice's shoulder to keep her close and to reassure her that she'd be safe with Rose. "Doctor!"

"Rose!" came the shout back, but it wasn't the Doctor. It was Jack, and he was close.

"Jack!"

Alice looked up at Rose in surprise. "Who's Jack?"

"He's my . . . friend," Rose supplied unhelpfully. "He travels with me and the Doctor. Just picked him up, really." She couldn't help smiling at that. Picked him up. Sometimes she felt like that, like the Doctor just collected people and she was lucky enough to be one of those people.

Sometimes she felt like a painted stamp, though. So there was that...

Alice frowned. "How many of you are out here?"

Rose tried not to notice that Alice was scooting further away from her. "Just the three of us."

Alice scooted back in closer at that. "Okay."

"Jack!" Rose shouted again, trying not to be so loud that she would hurt Alice's ears but also loud enough to grab Jack's attention.

Sure enough, she could see the flash of a blue coat through the trees, and Jack came barreling through, all smile and hellos as soon as he saw Alice. "Captain Jack Harkness. How do you do?" Jack said, taking Alice's hand.

Alice giggled, and Rose tried very hard to look annoyed with Jack and not to giggle along.

"Are you the one who screamed?" Jack asked when he was done smiling and winking and being . . . well, being Jack.

Alice nodded.

"Can you tell me what happened?"

Alice turned to Rose as if asking for permission. When Rose nodded, she took a deep breath, but instead of bursting into tears, she asked, "Where the Doctor? Rose said he was coming too."

Jack glanced at Rose and raised his eyebrows, but she just shrugged, so Jack looked back at Alice. "He was right behind me before we decided to separate to cover more ground . . . ."

"Good. I'll make this quick then," Alice said, and suddenly, she was completely changed. She was no longer the cowering, crying girl that Rose and the plaid-wearing boy had found and rescued. No, she was powerful and commanding, and Rose took a step back before her mind had even registered what was happening.

Alice started to speak in a weird language Rose had never heard before but sounded a lot like Latin, and Jack's eyes widened. He rushed forward, his hands outstretched, but Alice said something different in a much sharper tone, and Jack went flying backward into a tree.

That was when Rose's brain got over the shock and jumped right into fight-or-flight. She took off running, heading for Jack, intending to take him with her, but then she was airborne, flying towards the trees.

And then she blacked out.

...

"Rose?" the Doctor shouted. He was trying to fight the rising panic, trying to remind himself that it was a big forest and definitely very easy to get lost in it. Don't go wandering off, that's what he was always telling her, and then she went and did and he was stuck trying to find her.

"Jack?" he tried again. Maybe Jack was closer and could hear him.

He waited, but there was still no answer. Sighing, the Doctor leaned against the nearest tree, folded his arms, and jumped in surprise when a smallish spider crawled out of his sleeve. He shook it off onto the tree and couldn't help smiling when he remembered Rose carrying the jacket full of leaves.

"And we were having such a good day," the Doctor muttered under his breath. He sighed, brushed himself off, and set back on the trail through the woods, now thoroughly convinced that he was lost.

He kept going until he found a road breaking into the trees. At last! Something he could follow. Maybe he'd find a small town or some Park Rangers.

As the Doctor followed the road, he kept reminding himself that Rose and Jack were probably just lost in the trees. And then another part of his mind kept piping up and pointing out that someone had been screaming for a reason, and given his companions' penchant for trouble, they'd probably just discovered the reason for those screams.

The Doctor frowned and picked up his pace.

He was just starting to think that maybe he was headed the wrong way and this was the road _away _from civilization when he spotted a car in the distance. It was long and black and shiny, and he wasn't as good with cars as his third incarnation, but he was pretty sure it was an older model even for this time. Typical small town car, he guessed. Must be locals.

He broke into a jog, headed toward the car, and now he could see three people gathered around the car. One older man, two teenagers (probably his sons). The older man was talking to his oldest son, giving instructions. "If the cops grabbed her, she'll be at the station."

"Already on it," the older son said. His back was straight, his attention rapt, and the Doctor recognized the look of a soldier taking orders. He'd seen it so many times before. He just didn't like it when it was a son and a father. (That kind of thing was why he'd left Gallifrey, after all. He wasn't too keen on the idea of strict authoritative figures.) The Doctor walked forward, meaning to break in and introduce himself, but he was still too far away, and the older son simply said, "Got my IDs in my pocket, Dad. Meet you there."

So the Doctor arrived to find only two men there, and it was obvious they had seen him approaching from the way they looked him over. The younger one, the one who didn't have the soldier look to him, tilted his head at the Doctor. "What are you doing out here?" he asked, and the Doctor had a feeling that his father would have asked in a much more accusatory tone.

"I'm looking for two friends of mine. Have you seen them?" the Doctor asked. "A blonde in a red hoodie and a taller bloke in a long coat?"

Something changed in the way these two were looking at him. The father leaned forward, his eyes suddenly less shaded. "Your friends are missing?"

The Doctor nodded. "We were hiking, and we heard someone scream," he said by way of explanation.

"We heard it, too," the father said. "We pulled over to see what it was."

"Your son said something about the police?" the Doctor asked, knowing, somehow, that this man wouldn't tell him that unless he pried.

And the Doctor was right. The father looked surprised but quickly masked it. "Yes, he said a policewoman found the lost girl and was taking her back to the station with her partner." He frowned. "But if your friends are missing now, too . . . ."

The Doctor frowned, thinking. It would be just like Rose to take things into her own hands, to create an identity for them. Maybe the policewoman _was _Rose. But then why wouldn't she wait for him? Well, if she was at the station, she was safe. But if she wasn't, he couldn't stop looking for her. "Are you headed to the station now?" the Doctor asked.

"We thought we'd look around the woods first to see if we can find whatever scared the girl," the father said.

"Maybe you could help us," the younger son supplied (to his father's obvious chagrin). "Where did you last see your friends?"

"I got a bit turned around," the Doctor admitted, "but I think I could take you back the way I came."

The father grunted his approval, and the younger son beamed. He seemed glad to have someone else along for the ride (though judging by the father's demeanor, the Doctor wasn't all that surprised). "Great. We'll just grab some supplies."

And then the father handed his son a shotgun, and the Doctor was very definitely sure he didn't like this man.


End file.
